1(2)2016+.pdf


The Novel “Ararat”:  
the Way to Salvation

The novel “Ararat” was written by the American writerElgin Groseclose who was born on November 25,
1899 in Waukomis, OK, and died after a stroke, April 4, 1983.
Groseclose performed refugee work in the Soviet Caucasus
during the 1920’s, which served as the basis of his novel
“Ararat”, winner of two awards: the 1939 National Book
Award and the 1940 Foundation for Literature Award. 

The main concern of Elgin Groseclose in the novel
“Ararat” is to try to find the answer to one basic question:
“Upon what does survival depend?” (p.xiii) How does it
happen that some nations survive, while others disappear?
How did the Jews, the Nestorians, the Ainu survive? Does it

depend on the will of God? “Can we say that God, for some purpose inscrutable to man,
has willed the preservation of certain ones, certain communities, certain cultures, while
permitting others to perish?” (p. xiii) To answer this riddle he dares to turn to the
Armenians: to those who have been through the flood, those who have descended the
mountain after the receding waters, “who have seen nations come and go, kings arise and
fall, and the plow follow the sword.” (p. xii) 

“Ararat” is a novel about a small community of Armenians which survives the
bloodshed organized by Abdul Hamid, and which under the guidance of an American
missionary, Amos Lyle, finds refuge in a plain called Bartzan, not far from Kars, on the
bank of the Araxes, just at the foot of Ararat. They live and prosper here for more than
ten years, but then the community gradually dies. The moneylender of the community
goes to America to have a larger and safer perspective of development, and the mayor of
the community, who is a member of Dashnak party, is invited to Erivan to have a vaster
arena of activities. The missionary’s ministry, which lasted for 25 years, comes to an end,
and he, together with 12-year-old Sirani, an orphan, moves to Kars. There he goes on
with his work as a missionary, gathers homeless children from all over Armenia and
takes care of them with the scarce means provided by the missionary board and some
occasional individuals. 

Paul Markov, a captain of the Russian Imperial Army, who flees from the wrath of
the red revolution, sees two orphans at a railway station on his way to America. Filled
with compassion for them, he takes them on the train, where a man advises him to take
the children to Amos Lyle. Doing so Markov finds himself under the roof of the
missionary and his daughter Sirani. The appalling condition of the children, who are left

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Armenian Folia Anglistika Literature

Svetlana Toumanian