EcoLur
Climate Change: Personal Viewpoint. Our next interviewee is Violet Grigoryan, poet, essayist, member-founder of “Inqnagir” Literary Club, and member of Writers’ Union of Armenia.
Which environmental problems in Armenia and worldwide are you most worried with?
Environmental problems shouldn’t be considered only at local level and separated them from the general context. We don’t live on a desert island that has no connection with other islands. We live on one planet and problems connected with this planet should worry everybody to the same extent. Nature has changed due to our operations and activities. Nature is a system of interconnected organisms. Changes in one place can’t help leaving consequences and traces in another place. For example, bird flu or natural disasters don’t need an entry visa to enter Armenia.
Problem with water is of special importance for Armenia. Sevan was considered as a hopeless lake, and in the period of the USSR there was a project on drying Sevan so as to set gardens on that particular spot. Thanks to God, this project was not carried out, and consequently projects on saving Sevan have emerged. Lake drying is not only a water problem, but also an impact on the whole microclimate, fauna and fish species. Let’s hope they’ll manage to save Sevan.
In 1997 I visited the USA, where there was a thick book about birds in Armenia in one of their libraries and somebody was looking through this book delightedly. I joked we ate most of them in those cold and dark years; nowadays our Red Book is annually complemented. We just empty nature and take very few measures to recover damages caused. In the present world the task is to establish mechanisms for stimulating reproduction of used resources.
During the USSR the industry of Armenia, chemical plants were not subject to public supervision. Today NGOs and movements have been established that seek to struggle against those business projects which are based on capital gains only through neglecting environmental problems. International capital also participates in such exploitation turning our country into a Third World colony, while the exploited object will turn into a spot for hazardous industrial wastes. Protective mechanisms and modern technologies are needed to stop all this, which presupposes to have an education society.
Do nature and environment inspire you in your creative activities?
Topic of moving away from nature is touched upon in my early works. For example, in my “Otaratsum” poem I tell how I am connected with nature through books, movies and pictures. I can meet unknown flowers and plants only in poems, in the form of words or perfume I use. I can see wild animals, forests and rocks on pictures, while in the movies I can see waterfalls, volcanoes and so on, and I admire them in a safe distance. In order to meet nature in the complete meaning of this word, in today’s comprehensible and processes world, you should sit into your car and drive long until you reach a special “theater” directed by nature where nature plays on her own. My poem speaks about this particular thing. In the years of earthquake, war, cold, and depressed mood topic of death under the conditions of public life and territory elimination, which till them had been presented ironically in my works, were dramatized, while omen of nature was personalized and introduced into my poems as so to substitute destroyed public life.
Politicians, scientists etc speak about climate changes and predict catastrophes. Do you feel these changes and how can you notice them?
In the modern world people cannot take part in the discussion of many issued and their participation is a simple imitation. Recently Wikileaks unveiled this imitation in politics, the same is in ecology. Huge amounts of information, texts and presentations quickly appear in front of our eyes and disappear without discussions and interrelations and under these conditions power of experts is established. The same is in ecology. We just repeat experts’ emotions. We ourselves have no chances for discussions, examinations and studies of this. Consequently, we may be subject to manipulations. In order to avoid that we must spend time to get to know with information received from independent experts. We can see signs of climate changes with the naked eye, disturbance of weather sequence; it snows in the summer and warm weather in winter. Weather geography has been disturbed. Natural disasters reign everywhere, but we cannot even assume why all this takes place. It’s not sufficient to study ozone holes, you should also have an opportunity to use gigantic resources of research centers.
What influence can culture and art have on environment preservation?
Art is a specific language, and if art tries to touch environmental topics not specific to its language, it can be found in a funny situation. That is, it will be either non-convincing or a lecture on moral topics whatever is far from art. Basic disciples exist in the modern world, but art doesn’t comply with any of them functionally, it forms a new language by which we can speak about ecology. With the help of this very language power of experts can be partially overcome and form an own and entirely new direction. In case of ecology German Art Theorist Joseph Beuys is an interesting example with Greens Party formed on the basis of his activities.
To what extent are you willing to change your life style for environment conservation?
I think this question has a little bit hypocrisy, as problems that must be solved at level of people with power and big capital, are lowered at level of individuality. This leads away from raising this issue at political level. For example, on one hand whole forests disappear from interrelations of authorities and oligarchs, on the hand, these are several poor cutting down a couple of trees. In this context converting ecology into a personal issue means to mar the problem. Ecology is a political issue.
I have a bitter experience of 92-93 years, these cold and dark years. Once several neighbors started cutting down trees just in front of our balcony. My father had been taking care of these trees for years and so carefully, that people thought he was the guard of that area. I phoned the Municipality and complained, officers came and caught these people, trees were safe, but so far I can’t forget a lad who was crying with a saw in his hands, who, as I learnt later, was an orphan. I thought I was acting bravely, as a phone call to the Municipality is associated with “squeal” in Armenia. I suffered in my neighbors’ opinion, though I tried to save trees my father had been taking care of and thereby become an example for the rest. The lad was trying to bring an excuse to his actions with tears on his eyes, though maybe his frozen siblings were waiting for him at home. After this incident I got it: people are also trees, fragile and vulnerable trees. And that lad trying to cut down the tree is not guilty; the government to frazzle them must be blamed.
January 28, 2011