During World War I, Ottoman Turkish forces systematically deported and exterminated Armenians living within Turkey. Pailadzo Captanian, an Armenian who survived a forced march to Syria while pregnant, published in 1919 a French language memoir of her experience. The memoir has never been translated into English, despite Captanian’s having relocated to the United States, where she made an impact on popular American cuisine.

In “Redemption in Translation: An Armenian Woman’s Memoir of Genocide,” I will translate into English and write theological and literary reflections on Pailadzo Captanian’s Mémoires d'une déportée arménienne. I will study accounts of the Armenian Genocide and relevant theologies, and use an array of translation tools to produce a responsible and artful English-language version of Captanian’s work. I will visit Turkey to pay homage to the Armenians who died and those, like Pailadzo Captanian and my own grandfather, who endured. By translating into English, writing a reflection on, and seeking a publisher for, Captanian’s memoir, I will remember and honor a particular woman of letters. While the project will shed light on a nation’s historic campaign of organized brutality against an ethnic minority, ultimately it will serve God’s redemptive purposes of truthful revelation, healing, justice, and peace.