This was an interesting book in that a lot of it covered events from the Armenian genocide, but it also included some of the Arab-Israeli fighting in 1948. The main focus of the book, though, was on Ohannessian's life and his ceramics work.
Azad commented that the book mentions finding oil in Aleppo, but there is no oil in Aleppo. There is some somewhat further east in Syria.
Azad also said that so much of the book was very depressing with it's reports of what was done during the genocide. He noted that the Ohannessian family walked a long distance to reach Aleppo. Azad's father and two younger brothers, along with their mother, walked a similar distance to get to Aleppo from Samsun during the genocide.
Margaret liked the mention of Ohannessian's connection to Komitas, who was in Kutahya while Ohannessian was there. She also liked the reference to the picnics that the family would go on and the food that they would have.
Jim liked the attention that was paid to daily life, with enough focus on detail to make it interesting.
Francis noted the full description of how when a woman married she had to move in with her husband's family.
Azad noted that when Ohannessian lived and worked in Jerusalem, his shop was located in what is now a very expensive location.
The book talks a lot about how the clay available in the Kutahya area was perfect for making tile. When Ohannessian ended up in Jerusalem he had to search to find clay which would work, but it never was as good. There is also a lot of discussion about how the colors were made, how the tile finish was done, etc.
There are a lot of very good full color pictures in the book, too.
We all enjoyed the book and learned a lot from it.
We didn't pick a book for the next meeting, but the assumption is that it will be the book "Armenian-American Sketches" by Bedros Keljik. I know that a few of us have ordered copies of the book, but I don't know if anyone has received it yet. Let me know if you have your hands on a copy. The next meeting is scheduled for February 18th, so that's less than two weeks away.
See you next time.
Leroy
ACOM Book Club January Meeting 2021
The ACOM Book Club met on Thursday, January 21, 2021, as a virtual meeting using Zoom. Attendees this month were Francis, Tom, Azad, Al, Jim, Margaret and me.
The book for this month was "Feast of Ashes: The Life and Art of David Ohannessian" by Sato Moughalian. The author is David Ohannessian's granddaughter.
The book starts out with several pages talking about how the author slowly learned about her grandfather while she was growing up, but had to do a lot of searching to get the full information about the genocide and how his family was able to survive it.