The Willy Nilly Saroyan

Project Youth: with Lucy, Sylvie and Ashod

At a recent gathering of thinking people, in a jovial effort to start thoughtful conversation the host threw in the question, “What would you wish to have done or accomplished during your lifetime which seems unlikely or even unimaginable?”

Well, well. That was a pretty good discussion point Jesse, and thanks for bringing up the subject. Someone in the room wished he could host SNL (Saturday Night Live), another person wished he could be on stage with SOAD (System of a Down). The host himself wanted to be on an aircraft carrier while fighters took off and landed. I guess it’s the smell of petrol in the morning! Or is it napalm?!

I knew what I wanted, and I still do: To spend a day with William Saroyan. In my mind, one of the most influential Armenians I have never met.

Of the few individuals who have shaped my Armenian self, William Saroyan is one of them. I would have loved to spend a day with him anywhere between Manhattan and Malibu or somewhere in between. He has been exceptional at defining what it means to be Armenian and what it means to be American, but most importantly, what it means to be an Armenian in America: proud, articulate and very comfortable with the heritage.

William Saroyan was a Pulitzer Prize and Oscar winning author who took the literary world by storm in the 1930’s. He wrote over 60 books, and created some 7000 paintings and drawings. His first published work, in 1934, was a short story with the ravishing title, “The Daring Young Man on a Flying Trapeze”. His masterpieces include a timeless play, “Time of Your Life”, and the novel, “The Human Comedy”.

He was born in Fresno, the “new Armenia” of his times, but also went swimming in Malibu, bicycle riding in Beverly Hills, took long walk in Paris, was in the pages of the New York Times, year after year, as a daring young writer and a dashing celebrity with his heart stuck in the (Armenian) highlands.

“I write in English, and I’m an American, but the soul that allows me to write is Armenian. I consider myself an Armenian writer”. That is what Saroyan used to say once and for all answering the question as to who is an Armenian, and what makes the Armenian writer.

Following his death in 1981, half of his cremated remains were enshrined in the Pantheon in Yerevan, Armenia, and the other half rested at the Ararat Cemetery in Fresno, California. He remains forever a native of America, and a son of the Armenians.

There is no doubt that William Saroyan is remembered as a literary gem gifted with simplicity of language. He used no more than 300 words of the English language to pen a massive output of literary works. Bits and pieces of Armenian words and expressions added to the narrative that built his public image as a charming ethnic curiosity case. Armenians were ever-present in his stories about Americans, and they were together part of the world stage where Saroyan was at his best.

He was an author who hugged humanity. “I’m a story teller,” He once wrote, “And I have but a single story – Man”. Well said Bill!

He also knew a thing or two about humor and had the wisdom to not attempt to change people or the world: “Be careful of people who do not have a sense of humor. They will make you suffer.” At the end, he knew how to avoid them or dismiss them, for his works are absent of characters one loves to hate. Simpletons, wise-asses, dreamers and small town underachievers populated the pages of his short stories and novels. That explains why critics refer to him often as the great American writer who did not author the “great American novel”. He didn’t write about the great American dream, he simply lived his own. He was himself the real-life story of one of us making it. The continuous story of a life well lived with people, events and memories, in a language so simple, a mind so free, emotions so true and a heart so pure. A true master in capturing the moment with openness and with outspokenness (but never controversial): “If a man is an honest idiot, I can love him. But I cannot love a dishonest genius”.

His works illustrate a delight in life. A celebration of the fullness and “aliveness” of life: “Live well, laugh well”, he used to say, “Writing is about being alive”. One of his masterpieces, “Obituaries” written later in his life, is a collection of impressions, remarks, comments and thoughts about people he had never seen or met, whose named he would pick randomly from the obituary pages of newspapers. The book itself, all 355 pages of it, is about living. On the opening page of the book, he orders the reader, “All aboard, folks”.

It is impossible to read any book of Saroyan’s and not encounter a passage or a remark about his views as a pacifist: “I despise war and violence, and I bitterly despise those who perpetrate or practice it”. He would have dreaded the fact that today his beloved America is engaged in, not just one, but two rotten wars. “When multitudes of men are hurt to death in wars, I am driven to grief which borders on insanity”. If he was alive he would have most definitely suggested the less messy route. And it would go something like this: Put the two waring factions in a room, lock the door and let them wrestle it out. The one who comes out standing is the winner and the rest of us can go home to our mothers. End of story.

There will always be Saroyan the iconoclast, the eccentric, the American patriot and the emotional Armenian for all of us to read and share, but for me, personally, he is the source of many Saroyan-induced moments in my life that I truly cherish. Many moments of grace and beauty:

I remember the time (Maybe 25 years ago) when I too bought a Royal typewriter, my illusionary connection to the beautiful words that his Royal typewriter would churn to make wonderful stories on men and mankind.

I will never forget the multiple trips I made to Fresno in the late 1980’s from Los Angeles to visit elder Armenians whose children had left home leaving behind their parents and collections of Armenian books. I would arrive to meet these elders, spend quality time with them and finally save their collection and return home with a car full of books to discover the gem in the rough – that first edition Saroyan novel.

I cherish the memories of Project Youth when four of us (including my wife), joined forces to take Saroyan’s works to Armenian schools in L.A., only to return a month later to discover that the students had created their own stories and drawings in the free-flowing, free-spirited style of Saroyan. Their teacher had posted them on the four walls of the classroom from floor to ceiling. I had tears in my eyes.

A few years later, on task as a father, the Saroyan style of telling a story came in very handy for a bedtime story to put my 3 and 4 year olds to sleep. The story of a little boy and girl would begin somehow in California, and then travel around the world from a valley (The Loire in France) to an island (Santorini in Greece) and then on to a mountain-top (Take a guess!), and come right back into our present world having met and encountered farmers, shopkeepers, dancers and simpletons everywhere. The story was always hard to finish since my children interrupted with the question: “Why?” or “Who?” or “How?” I loved every moment of it.

My children are grown ups now. A month ago they found my Royal typewriter and the result was a series of short stories and one-paragraph writings written by them, which, surprise surprise, had that yummy “Saroyan feel” to them: A beautiful hodge-podge of willy-nilly. The delicious magic of William Saroyan!

This column too can go on forever, much like a Saroyan piece. But I think that it should come to an end, having said what it originally intended to say: Live a Saroyanesque Armenian life in America. But first read his work, perhaps a story or two.