BOOK REVIEW: Marc Sinan: Gleißendes Licht. Roman, Bremen: Rowohlt, 2023. 273 pp.

Abstract

Marc Sinan’s debut novel is the latest contribution of German-language post-genocidal memoir prose. This, in turn, is the latest branch of transnational or internationally distributed fictional and non-fictional literature by authors of Armenian descent. On the one hand, they are in the narrative tradition of the languages they each use; on the other hand, they are united thematically by the intergenerational trauma of the genocide against the Armenians of the Ottoman Empire. In terms of genre, this literature belongs to family novels, and in some cases to travel prose. In Turkey, people of Armenian origin formed a discriminated and socially despised minority until a few years ago. They were virtually invisible. The memoirs of the lawyer and human rights activist Fethiye Cetin ("Anneannem" - My Mother's Mother, 2004) have contributed significantly to the de-tabooing. The author reviewed here writes in German and grew up in Germany, but his clearly autobiographical novel is based on his Turkish-Armenian family history. It is the story of his grandfather Hüseyin Umut, then a 15-year-old boy, who in 1915 observes Armenian children being pushed off his boat into the Black Sea. Later Hüseyin Umut marries Ani, the daughter of a wealthy Armenian. Her grandson Kaan, the author's alter ego, decides as an adult to retaliate and plans to kill the Turkish president.