PROF. SHEMMASSIAN LECTURES ON MUSA DAGH AT UNIVERSITY OF MINNESOTA
Wednesday, October 23rd, 2013
Dr. Vahram Shemmassian
NORTHRIDGE, Calif.-Professor Vahram Shemmassian, Director of
the Armenian Studies Program at the California State University,
Northridge, was invited by the University of Minnesota, Minneapolis
to deliver this year’s Arsham & Charlotte Ohanessian Chair Lecture on
Thursday, October 17. The event, which was cosponsored by the College
of Liberal Arts, the Center for Holocaust and Genocide Studies (CHGS),
and the Center for Austrian Studies with its Interim Director Prof.
Klaas van der Sanden coordinating, took place at the President’s Room,
Coffman Memorial Union.
In his opening remarks Prof. Alejandro Baer, Director of the CHGS,
underscored the collaboration of the Center with the Twin Cities
(Minneapolis and St. Paul) Armenian community, citing as example
the commemoration of the Armenian Genocide conjointly last April. In
turn, Interim Dean of the College of Liberal Arts Dr. Raymond Duvall
emphasized the importance of defending human rights and the historical
truth of the Armenian Genocide. He then introduced the guest speaker.
Prof. Shemmassian’s lecture dealt with “The Musa Dagh Resistance to
the Armenian Genocide and Its Impact through Franz Werfel’s Historical
Novel The Forty Days of Musa Dagh.” This was a fitting tribute to
the 80th anniversary of the book’s original German publication in 1933.
Armenians lived in Musa Dagh, a mountain situated some 10 miles to
the southwest of the biblical city of Antioch and overlooking the
Mediterranean Sea, since time immemorial. On the eve of World War I
they numbered over 6,000 persons. When served the deportation order
by the Ottoman government in late July 1915, their two-third decided
to resist while one-third was deported, mainly to the Syrian city of
Hama and environs. Those who defied the government were rescued by
French warships after more than forty days of fighting and transported
to Port Said, Egypt. They lived in a refugee camp for four years,
until their repatriation to Musa Dagh in 1919.
In the days and months following the rescue operations the
international press covered the Musa Dagh resistance through news
items, communiques, leading articles, and photographs. As a result,
donations of money, clothing, and other necessities were sent to
the Port Said refugee camp by people of various nationalities,
organizations, and agencies. In short, the Musa Dagh Armenians
were lionized, became a source of inspiration, and drew sympathy in
practical terms as well.
The Musa Dagh saga, once its immediacy vanished, would probably
have been relegated to oblivion had it not been for the pen of one
man-Franz Werfel (1890-1945). Werfel, a Jew born in Prague and residing
in Vienna, had learned about the Armenian atrocities during World War
I and had promised himself that he would write a novel about them. He
kept his promise. While conducting extensive research on the subject
beginning in 1929, he came across the uplifting story of Musa Dagh,
which he chose as the novel’s topic. The Forty Days of Musa Dagh, as
he titled his oeuvre, was published in 1933 in German and rendered
into numerous languages. The English translation appeared in 1934
and the Armenian translation in 1935.
The human drama so vividly portrayed in Musa Dagh captured the
imagination of artists and intellectuals of different nationalities.
The book and its symbolism also had a direct bearing on the
Armenians and the Jews. The Armenians were elated and grateful that
a non-Armenian had exposed their forsaken fate to the international
community. The Jews in Europe and in Palestine read Musa Dagh as a
beacon of hope for their salvation. Turkey and the Turks, on their
part, pressured the Hollywood movie giant MGM to shelf a grand film
project based on Musa Dagh, and to this day they manipulate the novel
to deny the Armenian Genocide.
Dr. Shemmassian concluded his talk by saying: “This year marks the 80th
anniversary of the publication of Wefel’s Musa Dagh novel. But it is
not a mere celebration of a past accomplishment, because the book’s
legacy is very much alive today. Four recent cases, among others,
prove this point. First, in June 2012, the Czech Republic held the
country’s first international conference on genocide studies.
Its general theme, inspired by the Forty Days, was: ‘Mountains
of Moses: Revolt, Resistance and Rescuing of the Victims of Mass
Extermination.’ Second, in March 2013, the Lepsius House and the
Moses Mendelssohn Center in Potsdam, Germany organized a three-day
conference titled ‘Genocide and Literature: Franz Werfel in an
Armenian-Jewish-Turkish-German Perspective.’ Third, also this year,
in April, an exhibition dedicated to the 80th anniversary of the
Forty Days opened at the National Library of the Republic of Armenia
with the co-sponsorship of the Armenian Genocide Museum-Institute at
Dzidzernagapert, Armenia. Fourth, The Franz-Werfel-Human Rights Award,
which carries prize money in the amount of ~@10,000, since 2003 is
awarded every two years in Frankfurt, Germany ‘to individuals, and
occasionally also to initiatives or groups, who have opposed breaches
of human rights, genocide, displacement and the deliberate destruction
of national, ethnic, racial or religious groups.’ The list goes on.”
A question and answer session followed a PowerPoint presentation of
some 30 pictures depicting scenes from the Musa Daghians’ rescue by
French warships, leading personalities as well as fighters involved in
the battles, the Port Said refugee camp, and the monument dedicated
to the resistance on September 18, 1932. A reception concluded the
evening.
http://asbarez.com/115333/prof-shemmassian-lectures-on-musa-dagh-at-university-of-minnesota/