Kathryn Grande, “Linking the Before, During, and After: Cultural Memory in Cynthia Ozick’s The Shawl”
In her award-winning two-part book The Shawl, Cynthia Ozick offers a work of Holocaust fiction that cuts into readers with inconceivable sadness and truth. In “The Shawl,” the gut-wrenching short story at the outset of the book, our protagonist Rosa witnesses the brutal murder of her baby daughter by a German officer in a Nazi concentration camp—an act which is indirectly catalyzed by her niece, Stella. In “Rosa,” the novella that follows, Rosa—who, along with Stella, survived the Holocaust—struggles to navigate life under the unbearable weight of her displaced memory and unresolved trauma. As we progress through the novella, we learn of Rosa’s recent descent from successful business owner to “madwoman and scavenger” (Ozick 13). We are also made aware of her severed sense of reality in which she writes letters to her dead daughter, who she imagines is alive and well. Despite her earnest efforts to share and process her grief, even to so far as to repress her memory, Rosa succumbs to the ignorance and apathy that surround her. In the reflections of indifferent others that she sees in the mirrors of her furniture store and in the people from her memories—images from “the life before” and “the life during”—that are burned into her mind and keep her tethered to the past, Rosa is reminded of suffering, death, and failure (Ozick 58). Even her lifestyle as we see it in “Rosa” comes to take on the likeness of her trauma, as she lives in hunger and squalor, isolated from the world in a “dark hole” (Ozick 13). It is not until Rosa meets Simon Persky, a lonely yet well-meaning and overly charismatic retired button maker who genuinely wants to get to know her, that we finally see promise for Rosa. In leading us through Rosa’s struggle and appointing us as witnesses to her journey toward hope, Ozick explores the relationship between identity, trauma, and cultural memory, demonstrating the repercussions of stories unheard and the requirements for finding promise in a world of doubt. Ultimately, through Rosa’s story, Ozick implores us to actively engage in cultural memory—to divulge, listen to, and sit with individual and collective trauma in order to heal from the terrors of the past—because just as with Rosa, the future of humanity depends on it.
In the introduction to her book Acts of Memory: Cultural Recall in the Present, Mieke Bal provides an overview of the concept of cultural memory which, especially in terms of its emphasis on both the individual and the collective, helps us to understand Rosa as both a grieving mother and a Holocaust survivor. According to Bal, cultural memory is “an activity occurring in the present, in which the past is continuously modified and redescribed even as it continues to shape the future” (viii). In other words, it is a process that “link[s] the past to the present and future” (Bal vii). Because Rosa is unable to sustain a life in the present and, as author Billie Jones writes in “The Fabrics of Her Life: Cloth as Symbol in Cynthia Ozick’s ‘The Shawl,’” she “struggles with her sanity, and her conception of reality, in which Magda lives, happily married, as a professor of Greek philosophy at Columbia University in New York City”—it is evident that this link between past and present is one that Rosa is tragically unable to make (72).
Another convention of cultural memory that deepens our understanding of Rosa is the idea that it “can be understood as a cultural phenomenon as well as an individual or social one” (Bal viii). In other words, cultural memory is neither an exclusively personal nor an exclusively shared experience; rather, it is all-encompassing—not “either/or,” but “both/and.” As Rosa not only combats the burden of her own trauma (in the unimaginable death of her daughter) but also that of the Holocaust itself (in her struggle to find a place in society and her desperate desire to educate others about it) through her story, Ozick seems to suggest the importance of understanding the vastness and complexity of cultural memory. Rosa is not just a mother desperately grieving the loss of her child, nor is she just a Holocaust “survivor” or a “madwoman and a scavenger,” as society has come to see her—Rosa is all and more (Ozick 36, 13). To reduce her to a “survivor,” as Dr. Tree does in the novel, is, as Wendy Zierler writes in “‘My Holocaust Is Not Your Holocaust:’ ‘Facing’ Black and Jewish Experience in The Pawnbroker, Higher Ground, and The Nature of Blood,” a “universalization of the Holocaust” because it assumes that Rosa’s Holocaust experience is the same as the other six million survivors (54). This universalization ignores and denies Rosa of the fact that she witnessed the gruesome death of her daughter, Magda, as a result of the Holocaust—a piece of her story and her identity that not only defines who she, is but explains the trajectory of her life. Moreover, the term “survivor” perpetuates the same erasure of individual and cultural identity as the ideologies that sponsored the Holocaust. As Rosa says in her own words, the term “survivor” is “a name like a number—counted apart from the ordinary swarm” which she sees as being no different than “blue digits on the arm” (Ozick 37). Here we see that, though intended in a consolatory way, calling her a “survivor” disregards the individual phenomenon as it factors into cultural memory, translating to Rosa’s disdain for the term. For Rosa, the term “survivor” simultaneously reduces her identity and denies her of her individual traumatic experience.
Similarly, to see Rosa as just a grieving mother is to consider only a part of her whole self. It reduces her, again, to a single facet of her identity. To disregard this cultural phenomenon is to overlook the fact that Rosa was subjected to the state-sponsored, systemic manufacturing of the death of over six million Jewish people in what was arguably the most heinous genocide in human history—and lived to tell about it. As such, Ozick puts great emphasis on Rosa’s telling of her own story. As described in “The Shawl,” during her imprisonment, “Rosa did not menstruate,” a biological tragedy we can infer was due to malnutrition as the next line reads: “Rosa was ravenous” (Ozick 5). Here we learn through our omniscient narrator that Rosa suffers from starvation and malnourishment due to the conditions of the concentration camp and the Holocaust. However, given the choppy, matter-of-fact sentences used to describe this, we can argue that the third-person narration of Rosa’s experience in “The Shawl” lends itself to a “universalistic interpretation of catastrophe” (Zierler 50).
This surface-level account of the devastation of the Holocaust contributes to a blanket understanding of the starvation suffered by its victims. However, it seems intentional on Ozick’s part, especially in contrast to the vivid language Rosa herself uses to describe her hunger in painting the scene for Magda. In recalling a head of lettuce that she saw nested at the top of a woman’s grocery bag, Rosa says: “…green lettuce! I thought my salivary glands would split with aching for that leafy greenness” (Ozick 68). Here, in the descriptive phrase “I thought my salivary glands would split with aching” we get a true picture of Rosa’s hunger—a picture we can not only see, but we can feel. This juxtaposition of language between the second-hand account of Rosa’s hunger and her first-person testimony of it—and particularly the way they lead to different interpretations of her hunger—demonstrates the importance of actively listening to the stories of others to deepen our understanding of the past. In the connection between the individual and collective elements of cultural memory we see in Rosa’s story, Ozick asserts the importance of actively working in the present to uncover truths and testimonials about the past and allowing those findings to, as Bal writes, “shape the future” (vii).
Correspondingly, it is reductive for Rosa to be judged based solely on her social perception as a “madwoman and scavenger”—the phrase the omniscient narrator uses to reintroduce Rosa in the first lines of the novella (Ozick 13). Reintroducing our protagonist, now 39 years after the events of “The Shawl,” the narrator abruptly begins “Rosa” with: “Rosa Lublin, a madwoman and a scavenger, gave up her store—she smashed it up herself—and moved to Miami” (Ozick 13). Here, in the reductive language given without context, we can begin to understand that Rosa’s social identity has been tarnished. The woman we previously knew as a loving mother who had suffered an unimaginable loss has been reduced to a “madwoman and a scavenger.” Of course, given what we know as readers about her past, we can surmise that these labels are likely connected to her past trauma. However, what is important to Ozick’s purpose here is that the community surrounding Rosa at the time she destroys her store likely does not know of her past and therefore judges her without seeing the entire picture. To that end, it seems that Ozick intentionally stages our reintroduction to Rosa using this specific language: not to sully our impression of her, but rather to denote the weight of those words among those who were strangers to Rosa and set the scene for the turmoil we then witness.
In “Between Nostalgia and Self-Hatred: The Problem of Identity in Cynthia Ozick’s The Shawl,” Jacek Partyka similarly asserts that this rhetoric “emulates the language of tabloids, with their characteristically strong, arbitrary vocabulary,” an approach which severely “narrativizes” Rosa’s trauma (96). According to Partyka, this specific use of language places Rosa’s trauma outside of the narrative, as it no longer allows for consideration of any mitigating context. As such, this image of a lunatic who destroys her business seen in the first lines of “Rosa” denies Rosa of the traumatic experience that catalyzes and, in many ways, justifies, her actions. Furthermore, the actions that bring about such rhetoric also instigate her move from New York to Florida—from society to isolation—and from independence to total dependance on Stella. For Rosa, this harmful rhetoric is a constant reminder that she has not recovered from her traumatic memory. Ultimately, the language used to describe her actions has a significant influence on Rosa’s identity—both in the way the world sees her and in the way she sees herself.
Beyond the meaning of cultural memory is the inner workings of memory itself and the understanding of this process—particularly the way trauma disrupts it—allows us a deeper understanding of Rosa’s struggle to reintegrate into society after the Holocaust and of her need to distort reality as a means of survival. Before we analyze Rosa’s trauma in terms of cultural memory, however, we must first establish a framework for our analysis. According to Bal, under the overarching theme of cultural memorization, there are three types of memory: habitual memory, narrative memory, and traumatic recall. Habitual memory is that which is unremarkable. This is the memory that is “learned in childhood, enforced by discipline, and carried along later in life”—the lessons we learn through basic human trial and error which we internalize to help us navigate the world around us in a manner that reduces trivial consequence (Bal vii). Narrative memory is made up of the memories that color our lives. These are the memories “surrounded by an emotional aura that, precisely, makes them memorable”—the moments and experiences of our lives which evoke passion and sensation (Bal vii). Habitual memory has a social element which makes it accessible in a cultural context.
Unlike habitual and narrative memory, however, traumatic recall is the harrowing reemergence of traumatic events. Because it disrupts narrative recall and habitual memory, traumatic recall has a “more problematic relationship to narrative” (Bal viii). With traumatic recall, “traumatic memories remain present for the subject with particular vividness and/or totally resist integration” (Bal viii). Additionally, traumatic memories are distinct from narrative in that they are “reenacted as drama rather than synthetically narrated by the memorizing agent who ‘masters’ them, or because they remain ‘outside’ the subject” (Bal viii). That is, because they are not “narratable,” traumatic memories remain present for the subject, and this presence is beyond the subject’s control (Bal viii). Unlike narrative memory, traumatic memory is “inflexible and invariable” in that it is rigid and persistent, but it also notably lacks meaning (Bal iv). Often presenting as an image, sensation, or emotion, traumatic recall not only operates beyond the control of its subject, but it also operates beyond the subject’s understanding. Further, where narrative memory is a social construction, the experience of traumatic recall is of a “tragically solitary” nature, meaning it is an isolated phenomenon experienced by the subject alone (Bal x).
Importantly, Bal notes, calling upon the theory work of Shoshana Felman and Dori Laub, traumatic memories must be narratively integrated, or forced into narrative memory, to diminish the power and control they have over the subject (x). The subject must tell their story—conceptualize and share it, effectively breaking down its “solitary” nature (as to this point it has been experienced by only the subject themselves)—to take charge of the memory by forcing it out of traumatic recall, and ultimately allowing for control over the narrative (xi). Bal goes on to explain that this act of narrative integration “can be [achieved] only in an interaction with others,” as a “second person” or sympathetic other (often a therapist) must bear witness to the recollection of the traumatic event, which makes it possible for the subject, or the “first person to come into his or herself in the present, able to bear the past” (xi).
As it is precisely Rosa’s inability to integrate the traumatic memories of her past that hinders her survival in the present and her capacity to imagine a future, examining the ways traumatic recall permeates her life will further our understanding of her struggle. Perhaps the most jarring of these permeations, as it is tied to Rosa’s violent outburst, is the collection of mirrors (and other furniture) in Rosa’s store—or, more specifically, her smashing of it. While we would be remiss to ignore the obvious connection between aggression and trauma in the act of destroying her own store, the circumstances that trigger her to commit the act are even more telling. On their impromptu tea date, when Persky asks Rosa why she smashed her business—which she had just casually informed him she did “[p]art with a big hammer … part with a piece of construction metal [she] picked up from the gutter”—Rosa responds: “I didn’t like who came in it” (Ozick 26, 27). Assuming she is referring to a specific race or races of people, Persky inquires, “Spanish? Colored?”—and what Rosa says next is key to understanding her motivations. Rosa responds: “What do I care who came? Whoever came, they were like deaf people. Whatever you explained to them, they didn’t understand” (Ozick 27). In these lines, and particularly the phrase “they were like deaf people,” we see that Rosa’s issue with her clientele was rooted in their inability or refusal to listen to her.
Rosa later expands upon this in a letter to Magda, writing: “When I had my store I used to ‘meet the public,’ and I wanted to tell everybody—not only our story, but other stories as well. Nobody knew anything. This amazed me, that nobody remembered what happened only a little while ago. They didn’t remember because they didn’t know” (Ozick 66). Here we begin to get a clearer picture of Rosa’s anger and frustration. From the social platform her business afforded her, Rosa tried to engage in meaningful, therapeutic, enlightening discussions with her customers. She wanted to educate them about the Holocaust, to share, not only her individual experience but also the collective experience, as she says, “other stories as well” (Ozick 66). However, as she refers to them as “deaf,” it seems her efforts to engage in this process of cultural memory were thwarted by apathetic folks who did not care enough to listen. Additionally, in the lines that follow, we can see that her frustration with this collective indifference was compounded by how little these people knew about the Holocaust. In these words, “nobody knew anything” … “nobody remembered what happened only a little while ago,” we can feel not only her disbelief but her sadness and dismay that such a devastating event—one that took everything from her and rattled her very existence—was not common knowledge to these people.
As Linda Weinhouse writes in “Cynthia Ozick’s The Shawl and Octavia Butler’s Kindred: Bearing Witness,” to “understand other cultures and groups, there must be an acknowledgment of the ways the past is alive for these groups” (66). The general sense of respect at the center of this tenet of understanding is the attitude Rosa seems to both need and expect from her customers. Instead, she is tragically met with a complete lack of interest and concern. In this way, we can see that the mirrors in her store, which boasted the reflections of those too careless and indifferent to listen to her story, become too much for Rosa to bear; so, she smashes them. In “Disruptive Memories: Cynthia Ozick, Assimilation, and the Invented Past,” Peter Kerry Powers similarly asserts that “For Rosa [. . .] the past is not a resource for responsible relationships with others in the present, but a siren song that continually calls her away from responsibility to others (90). This instance which serves as a microcosm for Rosa’s incapacity to reintegrate into society is an important example of this idea that her past continues to call her from relationships with those in the present. Additionally, because her attempts to educate her customers about the truths “they didn’t understand” were a subconscious way for her to integrate traumatic memory, their lack of interest and participation in these conversations denied her capacity to narrativize her trauma.
Furthermore, from the perspective of cultural memory, we can see how this societal response to such a catastrophic event denies Rosa both her individual and collective traumatic memory and experience, separating her from a world that can never truly understand her—and worse yet, will not bother to try. While Rosa permanently carries the horrors and atrocities of the Holocaust, the people around her do not have to carry the burden of even knowing about it—a reality that catalyzes her descent to madness and seclusion. To that end, we can see that this denial pushes Rosa toward the traumatic memory rather than away from it, ultimately intensifying her suffering and realizing the chilling words of María Jesús Fernández Gil in “Allegorical Traces of the Traumatic in Cynthia Ozick’s The Shawl,” which reads: “Nazi hell has been away for almost thirty years, its psychological burden has not to the extent that post-Holocaust life is hellish” (73). Ultimately, the ignorance and callousness of those around her make Rosa’s Holocaust experience even more real, and in response she detaches herself from the reemergence of “Nazi hell,” simultaneously detaching herself from reality.
In addition to the “deaf” people who came into Rosa’s store and the mirrors that cast their reflections—which represent the present, or what Rosa and Stella call “the life after”—Rosa is also haunted by one particular memory from “the life during,” which for them means “Hitler” (Ozick 59). This memory, which she shares with Magda, is the same story she tried to share with the customers in her store. Though seemingly insignificant given its context, if we take to heart Linda Weinhouse’s notion that “understanding the past involves recognizing the ambiguities and deceptions that suffering produces,” we can see that its meaning is paramount, especially in terms of Rosa’s trauma (64). The story details Rosa’s memory of a tramcar of non-Jewish Warsaw citizens which, because it operated on tracks and had a predetermined route, rode through the Warsaw Ghetto where “half a million” Jewish Holocaust prisoners were housed (Ozick 66). Rosa writes:
The most astounding thing was that the most ordinary streetcar, bumping along on the most ordinary trolley tracks, and carrying the most ordinary citizens going from one section of Warsaw to another, ran straight into the place of our misery. Every day, and several times a day, we had these witnesses. Every day they saw us—women with shopping sacks; and once I noticed a head of lettuce sticking up out of the top of a sack—green lettuce! I thought my salivary glands would split with aching for its leafy greenness. And girls wearing hats. They were all the sort of plain people of the working class with slovenly speech who ride tramcars, but they were considered better than we, because no one regarded us as Poles anymore. (Ozick 68)
In these lines, Rosa recalls the strange and harrowing juxtaposition between “the most ordinary citizens,” or the non-Jewish Poles, who were “going from one section of Warsaw to another,” living their lives business as usual, and the Jewish Poles, like herself, who were suffering the “misery”—that is, the starvation, illness, abuse, overcrowding, and overall degradation imposed on them by Hitler and the Nazi regime. Here we see Jewish prisoners stripped of their rights and identities, being treated like animals and forced to bear witness to “ordinary” life as it resumed around them—constantly reminded of what they no longer had as the tramcar “carrying the most ordinary citizens . . . ran straight into [their] place of misery.”
Perhaps most egregious about this intersection of normalcy and agony is that not only were the Jewish prisoners subjected to such appalling treatment while simultaneously being taunted by the lives stolen from them, but in the Warsaw Ghetto, their suffering was on display, or as Rosa says, they “had these witnesses.” About the tramcar, Weinhouse writes, “it passed through the ghetto every day, past starving, half-dead children, and the passengers did not see, did not care to notice the pain of others, as they went shopping for food that could have saved these children” (66). In this poignant description of a deplorable truth, Weinhouse gets to the heart of Rosa’s trauma: the bystanders, or “witnesses,” who see the suffering and let it stand. It would seem that, given Magda’s brutal death and the physical and emotional suffering she faces first-hand, Rosa’s Holocaust memory would be rooted in her personal pain—something done directly and specifically to her and her alone. However, because this memory of the tramcar is what haunts her, it suggests that Rosa’s trauma is not rooted in the events of the Holocaust itself, but rather in the feeling of hopelessness rendered by it. It seems Rosa recognizes the Holocaust as an unequivocal, unchangeable truth, the details of which are too unfathomable to recall. However, in the “deaf” people in her store who do not know of and refuse to learn about it, in the “ordinary” people in the tramcar who witnessed it and did nothing, and in her own inability to save her infant daughter from being thrown against an electric fence and murdered as she watches— Rosa feels the same relentless sense of hopelessness. In this way, we can see that this banal memory of the tramcar and everything it represents characterizes Rosa’s trauma. Moreover, as made evident by its persistent presence in Rosa’s mind and by her several failed attempts to share it, this memory also demonstrates the value of narrative integration.
Just as important to understanding the process by which memory is formed is understanding the repercussions of the inability to integrate traumatic memory to narrative memory—which, for Rosa, results in her distorted sense of reality. According to Bal, as a result of unresolved traumatic memory, a subject can experience either repression or dissociation, concepts which Bal then calls upon the work of Bessel A. van der Kolk and Onno van der Hart to define (Bal ix). Repression, as they assert, “reflects a vertically layered model of mind: what is represented is pushed downward, into the unconscious. The subject no longer has access to it” (Bal ix). In other words, repression is the process in which memories are stifled to such an extent that they are no longer part of our conscious awareness. Conversely, dissociation “reflects a horizontally layered model of mind: when a subject does not remember a trauma its ‘memory’ is contained in an alternate stream of consciousness, which may be subconscious or dominate consciousness, e.g., during traumatic reenactments” (Bal ix). That is, dissociation is the process in which traumatic memory (or “material that cannot be reincorporated into the main narrative”) splits off from the main narrative, creating its own narrative and with it a separate stream of consciousness (Bal ix). Accordingly, where “repression results in ellipsis [or] the omission of important elements in the narrative,” “dissociation results in paralepsis… doubling the strand of the narrative series of events by splitting off a sideline” (Bal ix). In other words, where repression erases, dissociation doubles.
With this understanding of the difference between repression and dissociation, we can see that although Dr. Tree asserts that Rosa suffers from “repressed animation” within his misguided letters, an accurate assessment of her unresolved traumatic memory would suggest that she suffers from dissociation (Ozick 37). If Rosa does in fact suffer from repression, she would not have access to the memories and stories she tried to share with the people in her store, which in turn would make it impossible for her to articulate them in her letters to Magda. Since she quite oppositely wants (or wanted) nothing more than to share her story, we can see that these memories are very much accessible to her. By the same logic, we can see that due to her hindered ability to integrate traumatic recall to narrative memory—which was the result of the absence of a sympathetic other—Rosa’s mind indeed “split off a sideline,” creating an alternate stream of consciousness. That is, as the result of her unintegrated traumatic memories, Rosa’s consciousness is severed, and she creates a reality in which Magda—whose murder she witnessed—is alive. Throughout “Rosa,” we learn that not only does Rosa write letters to Magda, but she has constructs an entire life for her deceased daughter—a storyline in which she is a grown, beautiful woman, married to a doctor and living in New York—a life far more immersive and interesting than Rosa’s own (Ozick 35). In this way, it is unmistakable that Rosa suffers from dissociation rather than repression, and while she struggles to survive in a post-Holocaust world, in many ways she lives through Magda. For Rosa, Magda is alive and well, because she has to be— Rosa’s life depends on it.
Given our overarching discussion of cultural memory, it seems we would be remiss to ignore the problematic nature of Dr. Tree’s forward, unprompted, and worse yet, incorrect evaluation of Rosa. Similar to the way that his use of the term “survivor” both ignores Rosa’s individual trauma and universalizes the collective trauma of the Holocaust, indiscriminately diagnosing her with “repressed animation” also perpetuates her subjugation. Even if Rosa is experiencing repressed animation, assuming that she does solely because she is a Holocaust survivor is, again, to assume that all those who survived the Holocaust experience it and are affected by it in the same way. Additionally, this presumptuous judgment once again reduces Rosa to one facet of her identity and of her trauma. Not only is Rosa not suffering from repression due to the Holocaust, rendering his assessment inaccurate, she is contrarily suffering from dissociation in part due to the ignorance of folks like him who operate within their own myopic understanding of the world and who assume and say rather than ask and listen. Though his letter to Rosa, which aims to, as he says, “close the books . . . on this lamentable subject” and seems to be well-intended, based on Rosa’s response (“drop in a hole!”) Dr. Tree does more harm than good (Ozick 37). As Partyka asserts, “The language of cheap consolation, even when used with good intentions, is demonstrated by Ozick as a mere overlay, which does not contribute to the healing of a still-fresh psychological wound” (96). To Partyka’s point, in terms of cultural memory, which we can argue is the purpose of this text, Dr. Tree and the damage he both causes and perpetuates play an important role in our understanding of the sympathetic other, as he represents what not to be.
While Dr. Tree epitomizes what is wrong in the world in terms of cultural memory, contributing to Rosa’s growing list of people who refuse to listen and/or assume to know, we find hope for Rosa when she meets Simon Persky. As we have established, Rosa’s dissociation and her persistent desire to stay tethered to the past is the result of her inability to integrate her traumatic memory to narrative memory—a task which Bal (along with the theorists and scholars she cites) relents is extremely difficult (ix). Given our examination up to this point, we can see that Rosa has been unable to do so because she has never had a true sympathetic other to listen to her story. She has never had a safe place, free of judgment or assumption, but has rather been surrounded by people who do not care to listen, like the people in her store, or people who do not believe they need to listen, like Dr. Tree. However, in Persky, Rosa has the warm and tolerant listening ear she desperately needs.
We see Persky begin to fill this role of sympathetic other when Rosa shares with him that she smashed her store. After divulging what she believes to be the gory, shameful details of her actions and misreading Persky’s body language (which is distracted and unfazed, not appalled), Rosa says, “See, … now you’re sorry you started with me!” (Ozick 26). Here it is clear that Rosa is still quite defensive and thinks very little of herself, as in saying this, she assumes Persky now thinks the worst of her. On the contrary, though, he immediately negates that thought, saying, “I ain’t sorry for nothing, . . . if there’s one thing I know to understand, it’s mental episodes. I got it my whole life with my wife” (Ozick 27). Here, when he says “I ain’t sorry for nothing,” we see Persky’s kind and understanding demeanor as he reassures Rosa that her story does not make him want to retreat from her. Further, when he says, “if there’s one thing I know to understand it’s mental episodes,” we also get some context from his life which explains why he continuously pursues Rosa: One, because he is lonely, and two, because he knows he has the capability and the wherewithal to understand her.
Here and in the conversation that follows we see that Persky is not only willing to listen, but he is also willing to share. He does not want Rosa to feel badly about herself or her situation, so to level the playing field, he shares a harsh reality about his own life. After explaining more about his wife’s hospitalization due to mental illness, Persky says, “You see? I unloaded on you, now you got to unload on me” (Ozick 27). Notably, in response, Rosa asserts the general doubt she has in other people: “Whatever I would say, you would be deaf” (Ozick 27). However, actively working to prove that he cares, Persky ignores Rosa’s comment and instead looks to further the conversation, encouraging her to share by asking: “How come you smashed up your business? (Ozick 27). In these lines, we see that not only is Persky patient enough to break down Rosa’s walls, but he is also compassionate enough to see why she needs them. Rather than being put off when Rosa opens up or making judgements or assumptions about her or her past, Persky is genuinely and wholeheartedly interested in her story—and, more importantly, in her telling of it.
In these exchanges and the persistent, unwavering nature of Persky’s presence—his willingness to pull Rosa out of her isolation and make her feel not only seen but heard and understood—we can see that Persky is the perfect companion for Rosa. In Persky, Rosa not only has something real to live for, but more importantly, she has a sympathetic other to listen to her story. In Persky’s active engagement in the conversations that Rosa has never been able to have, she can process her memory—shifting traumatic recall to narrative memory—and she can take control of her narrative and her life. Ultimately, through Persky, “Ozick suggests ways an outsider can participate, can learn and teach about others without becoming a Dr. Tree” (Weinhouse 66). In other words, through Persky, Ozick shows us how to engage in the process of cultural memory in a way that is helpful and healing to others rather than in a way that reduces them and perpetuates their oppression. In his kindness, compassion, tolerance, patience, understanding, and especially in his willingness and desire to listen, Persky represents everything that is right in the world—everything we need more of. With Persky by her side, Rosa can pick up the pen she once used to write to Magda and can begin to write herself a future. Through his example, we can learn to act as sympathetic others to those around us, healing humanity one story at a time.
Works Cited
Bal, Mieke. “Introduction.” Acts of Memory: Cultural Recall in the Present, edited by Mieke Bal, Jonathan Crewe, and Leo Spitzer, Hanover and London: University Press of New England, 1999, vii–xvi.
Fernández Gil, María Jesús. “Allegorical Traces of the Traumatic in Cynthia Ozick’s The Shawl,” ES: Revista de Filología Inglesa, vol. 33, 2012, pp. 61–80.
Jones, Billie J. “The Fabrics of Her Life: Cloth as Symbol in Cynthia Ozick’s The Shawl.” Studies in American Jewish Literature, vol. 21, 2002, pp. 72–80.
Ozick, Cynthia, The Shawl. Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 2021.
Partyka, Jacek. “Between Nostalgia and Self-Hatred: The Problem of Identity in Cynthia Ozick’s The Shawl.” Polish Journal for American Studies: Yearbook of the Polish Association for American Studies., vol. 11, 2017, p. 85.
Powers, Peter Kerry. “Disruptive Memories: Cynthia Ozick, Assimilation, and the Invented Past.” MELUS, vol. 20, no. 3, 1995, pp. 79–97. https://doi.org/10.2307/467744.
Weinhouse, Linda. “Cynthia Ozick’s The Shawl and Octavia Butler’s Kindred: Bearing Witness.” CEA Critic, vol. 59, no. 1, 1996, pp. 60–67.
Zierler, Wendy. “‘My Holocaust Is Not Your Holocaust:’ ‘Facing’ Black and Jewish Experience in The Pawnbroker, Higher Ground, and The Nature of Blood.” Holocaust and Genocide Studies, vol. 18, no. 1, 2004, pp. 46–67, https://doi.org/10.1093/hgs/dch039.
This essay was written in ENL 400, with Professor Evans in the Fall 2022 semester.