Metal Dreams (Erevan, 2018) is the second book and first novel of the Western Armenian writer Christian Batikian. It is significant on a number of levels, not least of which pertains to its contribution to the vitality of Western Armenian, an endangered language. This presentation however, will not focus on the often-discussed topic of the vitality of Western Armenian, the status of diasporan languages, etc. but rather will be a literary reading of the novel. Metal Dreams revolves around the lives, friendship, and love interests of its three main characters: the first-person narrator himself and his two close friends, all of whom are university students in contemporary Paris. My reading will show how the millenial generation’s experience of love and friendship — relationships marked by high intensity (emotional, time spent together), low committment, and thus often short duration — lends itself to a more urgent need to write, to inscribe the ethereal into a form of permanency and immortalize that which has already passed.

Jesse Siragan Arlen’s research pertains to medieval literature and intellectual history, with a particular focus on asceticism, mysticism, literature, and education in Eastern Christianity and Sufism. He is also a published writer of prose and poetry in Western Armenian

All welcome

Pizza and refreshments will be served

All proceedings will be in Armenian

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