4/08/2010

Forgotten Fire was such a monumental book in my life. I feel that knowing about the Armenian massacre is very important because Turkey does not want to admit that it even existed. They argue that the Armenians were just as hostile toward the Turks and that they should be blamed as well. However the fact of the matter is that even though Turkey may be making a semi valid claim, they are the ones who massacred millions of Armenians. The story of the Forgotten Fire is very tragic, and chronicles a livelyhood for a young boy in Armenia at the time. I see the things that happened to him as very tragic and sad, but that was a reality for many boys his age. They were displaced from their home, treated as chattel, and forced to live in abject poverty because their families had been whiped out. This was all due to the Turkish governments wildly vicious policy of getting rid of Armenians because they were a threat to Turkish independent idenity. You could certainly claim to be Turkish Armenian, but you could never claim to be solely Armenian. It is just sad that such a tragic event happened to millions of people, and I find it to be more emotionally devistating that the holocaust because I have heard about the event all my life, but never before reading Forgotten Fire, have I heard of any Armenian massacre. It was truly a Forgotten Fire which when you read it, will live on in the conscience. At least for me it has.