Paths Leading to Masada

This month's book club book was The Dovekeepers by Alice Hoffman.  One of our club members had visited Masada last year; she was the one who chose the book.  For her the story came to life, and she could retrace her memory of that place.  Having seen this book advertised in the Barnes & Noble and Amazon email newsletters I was intrigued by the plot description: four woman's journey of love, pain and secrets that led them all to Masada.

Toni Morrison described the story as harrowing.  A reviewer on Goodreads.com described it as bleak.  I have  ventured past the half way point but decided to stop.  To put it simply, it is a sad tale.  There were a few  points in the story where a spark of happiness was likely to be kindled but alas no.  The story is told from the perspective of four different women, each retelling her story.  The details differed somewhat, but the narrative voices were not distinct.  However, the book is a grand feat.  Very wordy and imbued with LOTS of sensory details.  I wanted to like the book, but that is not to say I dislike it...at least I don't strongly dislike it.  It did not capture my curiosity as I had anticipated.  Perhaps it was because after having completed sixty percent of the book (that's roughly 307 pages) I found the women's stories to be rather repetitive.

Sarah Fay of The New York Times Sunday Book Review wrote: 

The abundance of overstatement and clumsy description minimizes the impact of actual dramatic events. When the women take lovers, steal babies, cast spells, their actions feel contrived. Although, toward the end of the novel, one of the characters explains the uniformity of expression by declaring that she is passing on the stories of those who did not survive, this seems equally unconvincing.

In her acknowledgments, Hoffman reminds us that she is neither a historian nor a religious scholar and declares that the novel is meant to “give voice” to the women who participated in the Jewish struggle, whose stories “have often gone unwritten.” I have no doubt that “The Dovekeepers” was conceived as a worthy project, but good research and good intentions don’t necessarily yield good novels.

Melissa Allison of The Seattle Times wrote:

"The Dovekeepers" is a stunningly crafted work about a tragic and heroic time. It also showcases Hoffman's immense gift for telling stories about women, magic and complex relationships. Perhaps "The Dovekeepers" is the masterpiece she has been working toward all along.

Lesley McDowell of The Independent wrote:

It is a story full of contemporary resonances, from the fleeing of families away from the fighting, the building of a giant wall round the Jewish fortress, and the atrocities committed by both sides during fighting. It is primarily a woman's story, though, in which childbirth and love play the largest parts, and mothers and daughters populate the landscape, even when those mothers are absent. When Hoffman first began publishing, her world – in which women organised themselves against patriarchal laws with secret codes and signs, ancient spells and rites – was less familiar. Since then, this alternative view of female power has become more commonplace, almost a cliché. 

Whether Hoffman is conscious of that, or whether she is responding to tougher times, she effectively sets both Yael (who sees off a leopard by herself) and Aziza (who goes into the heart of the battle) against the feminine power of Shirah. These dove-keepers are not a happy alliance, cohesive in their womanly tasks. They possess different histories, but are forced to confront a common enemy. But this is still a feminised version of this moment in history, and Hoffmann has made it a real tour de force. 

Quietness

There's a certain sense of quietness that I am quite protective of especially during this time of the year.  The holidays are descending upon us.  As if under a delirious spell people dash here and there as if mad.  The things people say and do are more contradictory now than at any time of the year.  Commercials announce that buying a new Honda will guarantee a great Christmas.  Toys R Us flash toys in front of children so that all they can think about is what they don't yet have.  Church marquees announce peace on earth and joy to the world, but adults are stressed over work, relationships and wants.  Banks offer refinancing specials in order to give you more cash for the holidays.  It's the Most Wonderful Time of the Year will soon be playing on radio stations as people wait outside in line on Black Friday for shops to open and then push and shove their way into the store to grab what they want.  Seriously?  

There's a show on CBS called Blue Bloods, starring Tom Selleck.  It's a story about a family of New York City cops.  Last week's show was their Thanksgiving episode.  The grandfather and daughter-in-law were in the kitchen making Thanksgiving dinner.  Grandfather said that Thanksgiving was his favorite holiday, because there was no pressure to buy gifts; family could just spend time together and eat.

I agree.  Thanksgiving is the national dinner party day.  Families from California to Maine will cook a big meal with side dishes outnumbering the main dish seven to one (if not more).  The host home will be crowded with people and infused with so many aromas that pets go crazy waiting for scraps.

But it's a festive time.  When the turkey is done and the table is set, that's when the hustle and bustle comes to a halt.  When there's so much to eat that your plate can't hold everything, when you're sitting with people you love and care about; it's a good setting for giving thanks.  

Giving thanks is something I don't want to lose sight of...and that sense of quietness (meaning an undisturbedness from the holiday chaos). 

The North Wind

The North wind is blowing.  It picked up speed in the late afternoon as if in a hurry to get somewhere.  As I walked outside to take out the trash the wind reminded me of the movie Chocolat.  When the North wind blew, it carried Vianne and her daughter to different towns where they would set up shop for a while and make decadent chocolate.

Perhaps I could say the wind blew in my friend and the dinner she purchased from Panera, soups and salad.  Like Vianne, she, too, came bearing chocolate, dark chocolate to be exact, and plump red raspberries.  We both are anticipating winter and all the delights it brings: sweaters and warm coats, cozy fires, hearty stews and spice cookies, apple cider and mulled wine.  As far as we're concerned, the North wind can keep blowing for a while.  

Collecting Stories

Today is the first day of National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo), and once again I am ill-prepared.  Last year, like this year, I had great hopes of preparing well in advance.  Come November I would have an outline of a story, I told myself.  Yeah, well...  Here it is once again, and I am still not prepared.

Last Tuesday evening my aunts and uncles came over with boxes and envelopes of photos of Dad.  Aunt Evelyn had a wealth of black and white pictures.  Aunt Mildred had images of us and Dad that were pretty funny.  We swapped stories.  Dad loved to tell stories.  He and his brother and sister grew up on a farm where they milked cows, fed pigs, mowed hay, harvested corn.  By the time he was twelve he drove a pick-up truck back and forth from the house to the fields.  In the winter he, his parents and siblings would wake up early, hours before dawn to tend to the animals, while his mother would be inside the house cooking a big breakfast.  The children would trudge a mile or two in the snow to school.  His brother, my uncle Bob, would end up eating the cake his mother packed for him in his lunch pail during the morning walk.  In the summer they played outside by the pond or in the fields.  

The black and white photographs are a glimpse into the past.  I can just imagine a movie picture screen, big and white, in a large theatre.  The lights dim, and the movie reel begins to roll.  The film flickers; you can hear the distant click-click and soon a steady hum.  In the darkened theatre you see the beam of light and dust dancing in its glow.  As the film steadies, the movie begins.  Black and white.  Sun-drenched afternoon.  A tall lanky boy with a tan cowboy hat.  A younger brother, running to the house for lemonade.  A little sister with golden curls damp with perspiration.  A mother washing her hands by the water pump.  Her husband reluctant to stand in front of the camera.  The photographer finally corals everyone, and there, set against a back drop of trees and a barn, the family with three children stood before the picture-taker.

Many, many years later Dad carved out a pond behind those trees to the left and built a comfortable home for his wife and children.  It was there outside my bedroom window that I planted a Kentucky coffee bean tree during my fourth grade year in observance of Arbor Day.  The tree is still there.  It's one of the first trees to shed its leaves during the autumn season.

As the days and years go by we will collect more stories and more pictures.  It's just odd to think that Dad won't be in any of the new ones.  Then again...as we live out those stories we'll carry him with us inside our hearts.