People of the Book ~ Geraldine Brooks ~ July 15 ~ Book Club Online

[Radioman]

The Book Club Online is  the oldest  book club on the Internet, begun in 1996, open to everyone.  We offer cordial discussions of one book a month,  24/7 and  enjoy the company of readers from all over the world.  everyone is welcome to join in.

People of the Book - by Geraldine Brooks

You'll fall in love with Hanna Heath,  Geraldine Brooks'  edgy  Aussie rare book expert with an attitude, a loner with a real passion for her work.  How could she refuse this opportunity of a lifetime, the conservation of the beautifully illustrated Sarajevo  Haggadah, the mysterious Hebrew manuscript, created in Spain in the 14th century? The invitation will bring Hanna into war-torn Bosnia in the spring of 1996 and then,  into the world of fine art forgers and international fanatics. Her intuitive investigation  of the manuscript will put her in a time capsule to medieval Spain and  then back to Northern Australia again with a number of stops along the way.  This is based on the travels of an actual manuscript, which has surfaced over the centuries since its creation in Spain.

Discussion Schedule: July 15-19  ~ Hanna, 1996; Insect's Wing;     Sarajevo, 1940  July 20-24 ~ Hanna, Vienna, 1996; Feathers and a Rose;  Hanna, Vienna, Spring '96 July 25-July 31 ~ ~ Wine Stains, Venice 1609;    Hanna, Boston, 1996   August 1 - August 5 ~  Saltwater, Tarragona, 1492;    Hanna, London, Spring, 1996    August 6-August 10~ #5 ~ White Hair, Seville, 1480;    Hanna, Sarajevo, Spring, 1996  August 11-15 Lola, Jerusalem, 2002;    Hanna,  Gunumeleng, 2002  August 16-August 20  Afterword

(click twice to really enlarge)

Topics for Discussion
August 6-August 10 ~ "White Hair" ~ Seville, 1480

1. This is the story of Zahra (the Moor) who is brought from Africa to Seville to serve three very different masters. Does GB convey the experience of slavery vividly? How or how not?

2. How does GB convey the atmosphere of Seville in 1480? What do the stories of Zahra’s first two masters (who are not connected to the Haggadah) add to the book?

4. What do we learn about artistic technique and the lives of artists in this section?

5. Based on what we learned in the last section, what do you think happened to Zahra?

6. Is this story a plausible explanation of the presence of a Black woman in the illustrations in the real Hagaddah? Why or why not?

Hanna ~ Sarajevo, Spring '96

1. When Hanna looks at the exhibit surrounding the Haggadah, she says (p.320) “the point- that diverse cultures influence and enrich one another –was made with silent eloquence.” Has GB made this point with “eloquence”? What are some of the ways she has (or hasn’t) done so?

2.Hanna’s accusation of forgery adds one more plot twist. Is this effective dramatically?

3. If you were Hanna, what would be your reaction to your colleagues’ lack of support? Would you have pressed the issue?


Relevant Links:
Geraldine Brooks - Background information; Sarajevo Haggadah; Early Haggadah Manuscripts; Illuminated Manuscripts; Brief History of Illuminating Manuscripts; Around Sevlle Image Gallery;

Discussion Leaders: JoanP, Ann , JoanK,  & Traudee

Don: Well, I couldn't stand the suspense and stayed up most of the night and finished the book.
 Now I will go back and re-read the chapters under discussion and try to submit something meaningful.

In the meantime, there is one item that jumped out at me and that is the resolution of the clasp mystery---at least from Hannah's point of view.  I had predicted earlier that there would be no further mention of the clasps because they  had been reshaped into something else.  I was wrong of course but the story's credibility of someone looking at an old picture and identifying a pair of earrings  as being fashioned from the missing clasps is a stretch for me.

[PatH]

We're meeting a remarkable series of strong women who manage to get education or skills beyond what is usual for their sex, and make their way through great dangers.  Lola is one, and now we meet Ruti, who studies the Kabbalah, manages to save Rosa's son, and has the knowledge and determination to conduct the rituals that will make him a Jew, then flee with him.  In the next section we'll meet another one.  Sarah Heath is strong and a trailbreaker too, but she seems to have parked her humanity along the way.

[JoanK]

DON: I agree factually. Dramatically, it works. We find out more about what happens to the "People of the Book" (and the things of the book) than would ever happen in real life. But it does keep us looking for those little facts.

This is the section where GB explains the title:(p.264-5, Hanna speaking)"I wanted to give a sense of the people of the book, the different hands that had made it, used it, protected it". Perhaps that is a question for later. But when I read it, I started thinking about whether GB had succeeded in doing that for me. The answer I came up with was "almost". What is missing, for me, is the pwople who used it, the generations of families sitting around the table, celebrating the seder with this beautiful book. A Haggadah is almost part of a family, recognized by the family and part of its happiest moments. That is missing.

[straudetwo]

Don  

JoanP,  
According to Wikipedia, the Sarajevo Haggadah originated in Barcelona in 1350, NOT in 1492.  I am sorry. GB's book
has had an effect on me !

Briefly back to "WINE STAINS".
This segment is affecting and wholly credible. The psychological portraits of the priest and the rabbi are drawn perfectly,  as are all of GB's characterizations, though not all the characters are likable. But that only confirms GB's marvelous gift for observation.

Take the priest :  we see him as insecure, feeling guilty because of his imbibing, angry at  the sharp-eyed altar boy ("from a good family") who notices the "weakness", and scornful of the sneering servant at the inquisitorial office, who reports that  the wine was already locked up. Vistorini comes across as a shuffling old man.  He's been in office for 17 years. In all that time Rome had not promoted him from parish priest at least to Monsignor (which would have been logical).   V. is quite able to expound on biblical issues and enjoys debating with the rabbi (which might be more satisfying  than "preaching to the choir", perhaps?)
An example of what heresies he expunges  without hesitation is given on pg. 151

The rabbi: a scholar with an extraordinary gift for oratory, famous for his "silver-tongued biblical exegesis"  (pg. 152), whose sermons  attract Catholic clergy to the ghetto not only from Venice but the "terra ferma' in Treviso and Padua. The rabbi is a caring father, husband and compassionate leader of his flock. And he too has a weakness --- errare humanum est = to err is human.
One of the subtle nuances GB weaves ito her story:  When Vistorini happens on the rabbi early that morning after mass; the rabbi  hasn't seen him yet. His head is down, his back stooped, constantly alert to indignities that could be hurled or heaped on him.  As the men begin to walk and talk, , the rabbi slowly straightens up. Can't we just see the picture and feel with the rabbi?

The final confrontation :
Vistorini finds "nothing against the church in the TEXT ... but there is, I regret to say, grave heresy in the illuminations." Pg. 183.
One of the illuminations is the representation of earth as an orb.   "I might REDACT  the offending pages --- four pages", says the priest/ (Which ones? worries the rabbi).

When Vistorini asks WHERE the rabbi had won the haggadah in the alleged game of chance,  the rabbi blurts out "Apulia" (= an italian state SE of Rome).  All the while the priest has been freely refilling his glass from the rabbi's wineskin and getting more inebriated, and  also becoming angrier  --- because he could not refute the rabbi's argument and hated losing one as important as this.  As a desperate last resort he suggests gambling for the haggadah.  We know the outcome,  and we know that the priest struck the rabbi, who stumbled out.

Left alone (pg. 188), Vistorini has an epiphany:
The carved Madonna in the niche  to the right of the doorstep. The child's hand,  enfolded in a larger, calloused one that guided the tiny fingers to touch the polished wood of her toe."

The carved Madonna had a false bottom where the mezuzah was hidden.  
An experience Vistorini could  never  have anticipated.
We know he affixed his signature to the manuscript,  put his head down on the haggadah on his desk and wept.

[Radioman]

Saltwater:   this chapter moved me deeply and even more so the second time around. The depravity of those who inflicted such cruelty is something I have difficulty in trying to comprehend.  I had the same feeling when I visited Auschwitz.

The links which have been provided here go a long way in helping me to find a deeper understanding of the story.  I can see now that the Granada connection is one on which the Jew-haters could base their reasons for their vile acts.  The Jews had aided and abetted the Moors in taking and keeping Granada for so many years.  When Spain took Granada in 1492 it was payback time for the Jews who had lived peaceably there for centuries.  Just as Hitler sought ethnic cleansing so too did the regime of Ferdinand and Isabella and the Jews paid the price.

I am puzzled by Reuben taking the phylacteries after having converted. They are not small items easily concealed and he must have known the consequences of being caught having them in his possession.

GB gave us a vivid portrayal of domestic life shared by David and his family which really set us up for the brutality which followed.

We have now seen two strong and determined young women whose instincts for survival transcend the mundane efforts of mere mortals.  And when Ruti saved her nephew, and by her ritual assured the boy of a Jewish heritage,  she enacted the ultimate irony of redeeming a child of a Jew-hating family and restored him to his proper destiny.

The two women, Lola and Ruti now cause me to make a comparison between them and Hannah’s mother.  Is she a brave person?  Does she have redeeming qualities along the lines of those we attribute to Lola and Ruti?   I am inclined to think not. She is selfish and self-centered and totally lacking in the caring qualities of the two young women.

[JoanP]

JoanK, somehow I don't see the  illuminated manuscript on sheepskin parchment passed around the table at   family celebrations either.  It seems more of  a coveted piece of artwork - always in danger of being stolen, locked up secure?  Perhaps Dona de Serena's family - or the Cohen family used it -  
The book reminds me  of the women who managed to survive the struggles that threatened their  existence.

Can't you just picture Ruti with the baby boy - and the priceless book trying to get on the ship alone with others who had been expelled?  GB has left the shipwreck to our imagination - Do you think Ruti drowned?  The story was that the boy's mother drowned.  That had to have been Ruti.
 I have a question about the boy's  Jewish-ness. By the fact of his circumcision does the child merely appear to be a Jew?  Christians were not circumcised at this time -     Though Reuben and Ruti were  Jewish, this child's  mother, Rosa,  was not.  Does this mean that the child is not truly a Jew?  If it was thought that Ruti was his mother, I can see where he could have been considered a Jewish child.

 Don, I think Ruti brought the  phylacteries to Reuben  - shortly before his arrest.  She's been a brave and a busy girl.  What motivated her?    (Does anyone know what Kabbalah and Zohar were/are?)

The two women, Lola and Ruti now cause me to make a comparison between them and Hanna’s mother

.  That is interesting, Don.  I will have to think about that.

For an artist to wake up blind would be a dreadful thing - it would change his life - perhaps for the better. Maybe he had already achieved all he could in art and could take another path.

Gum, perhaps we can say the same of Sarah Heath - if she cannot continue to work in the hospital, perhaps she can take another path? Kidsal, I'm wondering how one can fight infection without a spleen...

More tomorrow - too much here to think straight.  You are all wonderful - your comments and insight dazzle!

[JoanK]

Ruti had said that she was going to say that the baby's mother (Rosa) drowned in a shipwreck. So it's left open: whether Ruti drowned or whether she arrived safely and told that story.

Ruti explains what she is doing: I assume it's correct. since the babies mother was Christian, the baby isn't automatically Jewish: he needs a ritual cleaning. That is why she immerses him in the ocean, and the salt water gets on the book.

 

[JoanK]

The Kabbulah:"(Hebrew, “received tradition”), generically, Jewish mysticism in all its forms; specifically, the esoteric theosophy that crystallized in 13th-century Spain and Provence, France, around Sefer ha-zohar (The Book of Splendor), referred to as the Zohar, and generated all later mystical movements in Judaism."
Acarta Encyclopedia.

[Babi]

 

Have you noticed too that when there is such cultural closeness, religious differences seem to be less important among the elders in the community?

 
  JOANP, isn't that as it should be?  Maybe that is because I am
now an 'elder', but religious differences should not divide a community and
destroy cultural closeness. And it seems to me young people are usually
less inclined to prejudice. Still, as we grow older, it falls to the younger
generation to protect and preserve those things we most value.

RADIOMAN, apparently Reuben took the phylacteries solely as a memento of
a Father he loved. I can understand that.  As to your assessment of Sarah
Heath, I have to agree.

Is it because the child would not be born a Jew that David turns his back on his pregnant daughter in law?  Is this religious intolerance in a way -  to disown one's son for religious reasons?
  Disowning one's son is very harsh, and  is much less likely to happen
now.  To be a Jew is perhaps unique in that it is not only a religion, it is a national identity.  It is this identity that kept the Jewish people from being
absorbed and lost during their long dispersion.  Their tenacity is what kept them
alive as a people, and goes far to explain the harsh reaction to conversion. Not
only Reuben but Reuben's children would be lost, as Jewish descent was through the mother.

[PatH]

Saltwater:   this chapter moved me deeply and even more so the second time around. The depravity of those who inflicted such cruelty is something I have difficulty in trying to comprehend.  I had the same feeling when I visited Auschwitz.

I had a similar reaction, Don, in fact I had a lot of trouble reading parts of this chapter.  I have a very strong stomach when it comes to blood and guts (the surgical details that Hanna wouldn't let her mother tell her wouldn't have bothered me) but I can't stand descriptions of cruelty and brutality, and the torture scenes really got to me.

[JoanP]

..."religious differences should not divide a community and
destroy cultural closeness. And it seems to me young people are usually
less inclined to prejudice."

 

Babi, I agree with you - - does it also seem that the young are less inclined to follow in the religion of their parents?  And yet, it is the young who risk their lives throughout this book,  to preserve the Haggadah - to preserve their heritage.  I'm thinking here of Ruti now.  Wasn't she wonderfully described? -   "a dull brown thing."  Poor Sparrow. No one knows that she is also a mystical practitioner and has explored her spirituality to a degree that not many, if any, of her peers have attained.  

 Her mother,  angry Miriam, "as tough as an old saddle" -  had no patience with the "dull brown thing."   Don, I see the Hanna/Sarah Heath parallel here, the critical mother, the daughter who can never live up to her mother's expectations.
 
Ruti is excluded from social activities with observant Torah families (because of her brother) and now carries on the affair with the married Micha - father of two little kids.  Certainly this would further exclude her from any hope of finding an honorable husband.  And yet it is Ruti who will carry on the faith, the book and the child into a new land.  I sure hope she didn't drown in a shipwreck, Joan.

[JoanP]

A few thoughts about Hanna - in the Tate.  The tears and sobs seem to be the first time she has mourned the loss of a father she had known nothing about.  Aaron Sharansky seemed so real, I had to look him up to see if in fact he was real.  I knew he wasn't - but the Francis Bacon painting of the man walking off into the wind with a dog at his feet - may have been this one.  I can see where it might have had such an effect on Hanna.

She feels much better the next day after this outburst...and goes off to meet the scientist from the Forensics unit who has studied the little white hair Hanna had found in the binding of the Haggadah.  It was a cat hair - and it hadn't been shed.  It had been cut.  Also, dyed.  That must have been some exotic cat!

[Aberlaine]

Since it was left open, I'm going to believe that Ruti and her nephew bought passage on a ship and made it safely to land where the boy had his brit (religious ceremony of circumcision) and was named.

Just call me a hopeless romantic.  We do know the haggadah survived, so why not its carriers?

[JoanK]

That is, indeed an interesting painting. This book is taking us to all kinds of places, isn't it?

[JoanK]

We’re ready to go on (or rather back) to Seville in 1480. In 1480, Spain was in the middle of the Reconquista, a time when the Christian armies were trying to take all of Spain back from the African Muslims (who had invaded Spain many centuries before). This would end in 1492, when the last Muslim stronghold (Grenada) fell, and the Muslims were expelled along with the Jews.

But in 1480, some Muslem leaders were left. Some Muslim leaders who had been defeated, still held power locally,  but were required to pay tribute to the Christians.

GB shows us a Seville ruled by an emir who has refused to pay the tribute, hence is always off fighting the Christians, and in danger of being overthrown. I was unable to confirm the existence of such an emir in Seville in 1480. (Seville had been conquered by Christians in 1248 and was the de facto Capitol of Catholic Spain in 1478 http://www.aboutsevilla.com/sevilla/history.asp): perhaps he is based on another historic figure, with the time or place changed. But real or not, the emir is real enough to our character, the Moorish slave.

She serves three masters, in three different locations. First is the artist's workshop. In the picture below, if you remove the modern people and squint a little, the street could be the one where Zahra worked in an upstairs room:

http://www.traveldeal-s.com/admin/images/seville-spain.jpg

But the most unusual setting is the Emir’s palace. Whether the emir is real or not, the palace is!! Zahra describes it (p.294) “...we passed from the portico into rooms whose magnificence has stolen the words from the mouths of poets”.

Does it steal your words? (I hope not!)

http://www.sevillaonline.es/english/seville-city-centre/alcazar-palace.htm

And the Jewish doctor, who takes her from the emir's palace, probably lived on one of these streets in the Medieval Jewish section of Seville:

http://photos-seville.com/santa-cruz-neighbourhood.php

[JoanK]

This book does send us on some strange journeys. A week ago, I knew no Spanish history: now I'm cussing because Google doesn't give me more information about Medieval emirs in Spain. Don't the historians on the internet realize that everyone is going to want to know that?!?

[PatH]

This book does send us on some strange journeys. A week ago, I knew no Spanish history: now I'm cussing because Google doesn't give me more information about Medieval emirs in Spain. Don't the historians on the internet realize that everyone is going to want to know that?!?

Indeed, how shortsighted of them.

[PatH]

Since it was left open, I'm going to believe that Ruti and her nephew bought passage on a ship and made it safely to land where the boy had his brit (religious ceremony of circumcision) and was named.

Just call me a hopeless romantic.  We do know the haggadah survived, so why not its carriers?

Aberlaine, one thing I particularly like about this book is that Brooks gets it pretty much right as to how much to leave to our imagination.  Too much and it's corny, too little and it's frustrating.  We know the child survived, and it's totally up to us to decide what happened to Ruti, but if she hadn't survived for some while, it's hard to believe the child would still have the Haggadah to bequeath to Dona Serena's mother.

JoanP, thanks for the Bacon.  It fits very well, I think you're right.

[JoanP]

Oh wait...while we're still in London, I can't resist one more link to the Tate before we embark for Seville.  Well, actually, Arthur Boyd's work was not in the Tate at all , was it- this bummed Hanna.  Not a single Arthur Boyd in the place.    Gumtree, this is for you - an Australian artist -

  Arthur Boyd's Artwork  I understand he is quite well known in the antipodes.  Do you like his work?

Isn't it funny that Hanna was drawn to art and painting - restoration, etc....without knowing anything about her father?  It was in the genes!

More about art coming up - and the beautiful illustrations of the Haggadah.  I love the way the themes spill over into each new chapter, don't you?  

[straudetwo]

JoanP
I find it hard to tear myself away from the characters in "Saltwater".

Now to your questions.
1.  GB  possibly chose Tarragona because of her plans for the haggadah. Tarragona was founded by the Romans who named it Tarraco Colonia Iulia Urbs Triumphalis Tarraco.  The emperor Augustus wintered there after a victorius campaign,  and one honorific of Tarragona became Colonia Iulia Victrix Tarraconensis.

5.  North African Muslims ("Moors") invaded Spain in 711 and went on to conquer several Spanish kingdoms (but not all). Over the next centuries  successive Muslim dynasties reigned there.  They called it Al Andalus.  At this time in the eighth century, a Jewish community was established in Granada; trade relations began and flourished.
 
With the marriage of Ferdinand and Isabella, their respective kingdoms were united; their power grew exponentially, and they wanted the Moors out. Numerous wars were fought. Spain had the support and encouragement of the Catholic Church.  The Moors were on the losing side.  Granada was their last stand. They capitulated in 1492.  Then the  Crown issued a proclamation for the expulsion of the Jews, as described in the chapter.

3. In comparison with his brother Joseph, David is a poor man.  Nevertheless David wants to make his nephew, Joseph's son, a respectable wedding gift, something special.
He sees the illuminations and buys them at once, though the family can ill afford it.  He himself will undertake the writing of a haggadah.

7.  Ruti would like to study texts that were held unsuitable for girls.  Her father will never allow her access to his library. But Micha, the bookbinder, has these books, too,  and she approaches him.  He is "a young man grown too soon old," who becomes nervous whenever his wife enters his workshop. The wife, we learn,  "is frail and drab, often ill, worn out by the bearing of children, several of whom always seem  to be trailing after her, crying."  Micha does not believe Ruti's ruse,  he realizes what a transgression this is,  but he agrees - for a price.

When Ruti comes upon Rosa in labor, she doesn't know the first thing. Her mother had been close-mouthed about "matters of the body".  I'm not sure whether we can call this an affair.  She is fifteen, has been an obedient daughter, a helpmate with hard work, and she was emotionally a little impoverished.  But she was made of stern material !
Allow me to say that the description of the  seduction, the lovers' last meeting and the birthing is a bit to graphic for me.

8.  Reuben converted voluntarily.  He promised Rosa he would.  Her parents were dead-set against the marriage.
It could never have been easy to abandon one's own faith, then or now, for that matter. I always look at the wedding annlouncements in the Sunday NYT.  In a number of ceremonies when one if Jewish and the other Christian,  each chooses his/her own religious representative, who then both officiate.

Will move forward tomorrow.

[Babi]

 I obediently squinted at the street in Seville..and loved the cheek-to-cheek
buildings...but couldn't help wondering if the 15th century streets would
have been so clean.   The palace of Alcazar is marvelous. The Santa Cruz area
doesn't look bad at all; I imagine it has been prettified since it's days as
the Jewish sector. Thanks so much for the pictures, JOANK.

 Your comments about the Christians, Muslims and Jews reminded me of the quote from Ben Shushan: …  “The Christians raise the armies,  the Muslims raise the buildings, and the Jews raise the money.” I suppose it held true enough at the time.  At other times, I think the positions change. There have certainly been times when the Christians (America?) and the Muslims (as in Saudi Arabia?) have 'raised the money'.
 

"..if she hadn't survived for some while, it's hard to believe the child would still have the Haggadah to bequeath to Dona Serena's mother."

Good point, PatH. I, too, want to believe Ruti survived, and this certainly
suggests she did.

[ANNIE]

I just reread the link to the Sarajevo Haggadah and found an interesting phrase concerning its "provenance".
Here 'tis:

"since there are two coats of arms in the bottom corners, one representing a rose (shoshan) and the other a wing (elazar)? Perhaps we will never learn." (Sarajevo Haggadah)

Does anyone suppose that the clasps that are described here in this book under the chapter entitled,  "The Feathers and a Rose",  are actually the two coats of arms described in the text about the Haggadah? So, that would definitely make that chapter fiction?  And well done by our author!  Very clever!

[Gumtree]

JoanP You must have known it was my birthday today though I'm not sure whether an Arthur Boyd would be my ideal gift - hard to live with - but then I could sell it off for $million ++  

Boyd is indeed well known here as is his family. He came from 5 generations of artists and each generation has had several recognised artists practising in different fields - Arthur combined painting, woodcuts and sculpture.

 His paintings vary in size from quite small ones 18" x 24" to the massive ones of 6 - 8 or 10 feet and more. He used a very vibrant palette and was the first artist I thought of when GB first tells us that Hanna's father was an artist. -for me  something about her description of her father's painting conjured up Boyd's use of colour and his massive canvases.

Boyd's work is very often mythical and allegorical and once seen is never forgotten perhaps because there is so much meaning within the painting which is not easily understood.

His old home at Bundanon is now an artist's retreat and eligible artists can receive a grant to live on the property for specific periods in order to develop their work - oh to be 50 years younger....

[JoanP]

Oh, Gum!  Happy happy birthday!  Let's all sing!  Your special day - how did I know that? For today, my birthday wish - that you feel like a 50 year old!


  THanks for the information on Arthur Boyd - I enjoyed his paintings from what I could see of them - and did note some resemblance to the description of Aaron Sharansky's work - especially the one that had hung in the Heaths' dining room!
Isn't the Internet and amazing gift?   To have so much at our fingertips - mind boggling!

It is amazing to me that these structures still stand after so centuries - that one can still walk the streets, touch the buildings ... and if a trip is not possible, here we are sitting in front of our computers, looking at the photos JoanK has found for us to examine - and imagine how Seville must have looked to the young slave kidnapped from Africa!

I love the way the slave's story is narrated - in first person. Hearing the sounds of the streets of Seville, with the sack covering his eyes.  Smell the smells.   Can't you just taste the sherbet?  I think I am going to take advantage of the abundant peach crop - and try my hand at sherbet.  I've never made sherbet.   Is pomegranate syrup available?

We learn right off that the slave is  a Muslim, whose father had been an important man.  More bloody, heartless violence, the father slaughtered as his child looked on.  Kidnapped by  the Banu Marin and sold into the service of Hoorman.  Who was Banu Marin?  A Berber?  The Berbers were preying on the Moors? Weren't Berbers Moors?   Were Berbers and Moors Muslim?    Oh, my history is woefully limited!  So Banu Marin sold the child into slavery - to Hoorman?

Is Hoorman a Jew? Is this the source of embarassment - for a Muslim to be the slave of a Jew?
 

[Gumtree]

Before we leave Saltwater - I was intrigued by the description of Ben Shoushan's working space...

Their house, like most in the Kahal, was a tiny tilted thing, just two rooms perched one above the other, so Ben Shoushan had to work outdoors, even in the chill of winter. It was barely ten paces from the street door to the house, and the space was crammed with vats of skins soaking in lime, and others stretched on frames waiting for the few pale beams of sunlight that would slowly dry them. There were skins still thick with their fat and blood vessels, awaiting the careful parings of his rounded blade. But he had a small pile of scraped skins, and these he sorted carefully, looking for those of mountain sheep, that matched the parchments of the illuminations. When he has selected the perfect skins, he set Ruti to work, rubbing them smooth with pumice and chalk

For the reader this is a reiteration working methods we see in a passage in the first chapter when Hanna drives to woop woop and the abbatoir in search of a meter of calf's intestine and how she needed it because If you are going to work with five hundred year old materials, you have to know how they were made five hundred years ago and then she describes how her hands are not the prettiest sight - chapped, wattled across the back...ruddy and peeling from scouring the fat off cow gut with a pumice stone

No doubt Ruti's hands would be showing signs of wear and tear even at her early age.

To prepare his writing material Ben Shoushan  was using methods  which were age-old even then as the following verse shows:

 How to Begin

To make a poem, catch a goat,
Draw a knife across its throat.
When all life has left the creature,
Skin it; dip its hide in water.
Add old lime and stir the pot
Till the mixture seems to clot.

Then throw the clotted stuff away
And add fresh water every day
For a week, in winter more.
When the water’s clean and clear,
Make a frame and stretch the skin,
Set well away from heat and sun.

Let it dry, then moisten it
And scrape the skin when it is wet.
On the flesh side of the skin,
Pour fine pumice, rub it in.
Now make the skin tight in the frame.
And wait a day before you trim
The vellum you have made.

 Then scan the sky for raven, goose or swan
(Some bird of size that does not sing)
And pluck a feather from a wing.
A left-wing feather if you can
Because such feathers fit the hand.

For ink, you need the bearberry,
And bark stripped from a willow tree.
Boil the mixture. When you spill
A drop that forms a little ball,
The ink is done. The vellum waits
The issue of the murdered goat,
The plundered raven, swan and tree,
The music of the bearberry.

This piece comes from a Recipe Book by Ari Borgilsson, in his 12th century Book of the Icelanders. It was rendered into English by Leonard Woolf who took it from a 14th Century manuscript copy that had been written using a very black carbon ink which was still in good condition. It is not known whether it was Bearberry Ink but the Icelanders used the bearberry to make their ink. Borgilsson was known as 'Ari the Learned' and his book was the first attempt to write  down Icelandic history.

[JoanK]

Oh, GUM: that's amazing!! I'll never look at a page of paper the same way again!!

[JoanK]

BABI: " couldn't help wondering if the 15th century streets would
have been so clean".

I agree. I almost added sprinkle some dirt around. We don't have time to reproduce the grime that probably covered the streets.

Those pictues of Seville really make me want to visit Spain. Everything I know about it is from our wonderful Spanish Seniorlearn participants, and from a DVD  called "Guitarra! A musical journey through Spain" (sp.) which tells the history of guitar music in Spain with Julean Bream the guitarest, accompanied by wonderful film of Spain: the scenery, the towns, the architecture, the art, the people, flamenco, bullfights (I closed my eyes) and on and on. You see much too much of Bream, and it's much too much for one sitting (or even two), but if you like guitar music, or if you want to see Spain, it's great. Netflix has it.

The photographs don't do justice to the tile work. I don't remember now if our palace is in it, but the Alhambra (near Seville) is, and many other fantastic places (I'm running out of adjectives).

But the earliest guitar work known is from the 1500s, after our adventure. So back to 1480.

[EvelynMC]

Gumtree, What a marvelous poem.  Thank you for sharing.

Comment on "Saltwater":  I too was absolutely horrified about the tortures of the Inquisition.  The first time I read the book, I read this chapter entirely.  This time, I just skipped over the torture spots.  I just didn't need to read them again.

Also, I cannot understand how Hanna's mother could keep the knowledge of her father and his whole family from her all those years. She is truly a heartless, selfish woman and seems to be a rotten kind of a mother who is concerned only with her own wants and needs.

I am going to read "White Hair" this afternoon. I am looking forward to it. 

Thanks for all those pictures of Spain.  I just love the architecture.  It'll be easier to picture the locations now.

 

[JoanK]

GUMTREE: forgot to say HAPPY BIRTHDAY. LEOS ROCK!!

[straudetwo]

JoanP
Thank you for posting the pictures of Seville. The entire region of Andalucia is scenic. It would be wonderful if we could view also Tarragona and Granada to complete our virtual tour of the sites mentioned in the book. There are good pictures of the legendary Alhambra, the huge fortress the Moors built.

Gum special thanks for that glorious poem.  
For you it's already Friday morning; sorry my birthday wishes are a day late.

"A White Hair" is a fascinating chapter.  GB has given free rein to her marvelous imagination.  

The chapter begins with a painter  who has been "in the service of a  Jew" for years and tells us  "We do not feel the sun here. Here, the stone and tile are cool always, even at midday. Light steals in among us like an enemy, ... It is hard to do my work in such light."

Except for that, there is an atmosphere of tranquility and harmony. This is all the reader gleans from the first 1-1/2 pages. Then there's a flashback to the time when, the painter was fourteen, the world changed.
The valued child of an important man was sold into bondage by traders, blind-folded, and taken to "the pavilion of the book". The blindfold is taken off. This otherwise undefined building contains a studio for calligraphers, a studio for painters, a workshop with rows of seated figures none of whom turns around.  The master is a man called "Hooman" who  sneers, "So you claim to be a mussawir?" A test is set : to paint a garden with foliage and flowers on a corn of rice within two days.

Another  quick flashback informs us of the past; family life;  devotion to the father, Ibrahim al-Tarek, an expert in plants for their medicinal value, pioneer in applying them for healing; apprenticeship and growing expertise in drawing plants.

(This reminded me of our discussion of the novel  My Name is Red by Nobel Prize winner  Orham Pamuk  about Persian art, and especially miniaturists.)

Having failed the test, the young painter is sent to the "preparers of the ground" =  a group of  painters and calligraphers impaired by weakening eye sight or unsteady hands. After three months there is blow-up with an old man,  an iconoclast, which ends that stage of learning.
There's a new beginning,  personal attention from Hooman,  hints and observations on what hair makes the finest brushes, and personal tutelage in portrait painting in his private studio. The work our painter produces is so good that Hooman has high hopes and plans for him. "An unexpected opportunity has presented itself", he says one day, concerning an appointment by the emir, "and I believe you are suitable, but such a person must, of course be cut ". Our painter faints and is discovered to be a young woman.
But she doesn't have a name, yet.

There is a great deal more before we learn (on pg. 312), at the end of the chapter,  that the doctor, her friendly master, had
given her the name Zahra, and that she was well pleased.

In "Saltwater" GB had presented Ferdinand and Isabella and the infamous Inquisitor Torquemada himself.

Now, in  "A White Hair", is the emira, Nura,   the young queen Isabella of Castile?

And isn't it even more exciting and auspicious to learn that Zahra was invited to celebrate the feasts with the doctor and his wife, and that she painted the scene?  The  very one in the haggadah?

[Babi]

 Hey, very sharp of you, ANNIE. By the time I read about the clasps, I had
forgotten all about the details of the cover.

GUM, where do you find marvelous things like a 12th century Icelandic recipe
book?!!  Generations of craftsmen must have treasured something like that.

 Here, finally, we find out how the darkskinned woman appeared in the painting
of the Jewish family celebrating a Seder.  How wonderfully imaginative an
explanation. I admiration for Ms. Brooks continues to grow.

[JoanP]

Ann, aha - the rose and the butterfly!  We see the beginnings of Brooks' inspiration in these details, which are slowly revealed as we move along in this discussion! Fiction - based on fact!  Thanks!
Gum, marvelous find - the poem.  In that case, the poet found a goat on which to make the parchment and then the  poem!  The artist's illuminations  were done on sheepskin - and then the creator of the haggadah matched with sheepskin - a sheep found only in the mountains - a sheep which became extinct back in the 14th century.  I'm going to go find that source again - if I can...to be sure I'm remembering the details correctly.

Have you seen the illuminated page which contains the painting of the black serving girl?  I think it appears on page 4 of the haggadah - again something I'd better verify.  This is from memory - Here's the illuminated page -  not sure which colors are more authentic-

   

Babi - I agree - this is Brooks' imagination at work - at its best, I think!  Not only has she used it to explain the serving girl's appearance at the table, BUT she has identified the artist - the mussawir - as a Moor - a dark skinned Moor and  a woman!  I loved that!  From the start of the White Hair chapter, we get an  introduction to the gender identity - the rape scene was harsh, of course, but what if the slave had actually been a boy?    Talk about harsh!

The servant at the seder table is a black maid.  The captive slave is ashamed to be the slave of a Jew! I think Brooks must have enjoyed writing this section - more than any of the others! She's addressed so many of her favorite themes here!  I really enjoyed it!

[JoanP]

Good thing I went back to check my memory - AND the facts -

The Oldest Sephardic
Haggadah
 
Circa 1350
Considered the most beautiful Jewish illuminated manuscript in existence, and the oldest Sephardic Haggadah, the Sarajevo Haggadah, was produced in Barcelona, Spain. It was written on bleached calfskin and illuminated in copper and gold, and opens with 34 pages of illustrations of biblical scenes from creation through the death of Moses. Its pages are stained with wine— evidence that it was used at many Passover Seders. It is preserved at the National Museum of Bosnia and Herzegovina in Sarajevo.

"The Sarajevo Haggadah has survived many close calls with destruction. Historians believe that it was taken out of Spain by Spanish Jews who were expelled by the Alhambra Decree in 1492. Notes in the margins of the Haggadah indicate that it surfaced in Italy in the 1500s. It was sold to the National Museum in Sarajevo in 1894 by a man named Joseph Kohen.

"During World War II, the manuscript was hidden from the Nazis by the Museum's chief librarian, Dervis Korkut, who at risk to his own life, smuggled the Haggadah out of Sarajevo. Korkut gave it to a Muslim cleric in Zenica, where it was hidden under the floorboards of either a mosque or a Muslim home. During the Bosnian War of the early 1990s, when Sarajevo was under constant siege by Bosnian Serb forces, the manuscript survived in an underground bank vault. To quell rumors that the government had sold the Haggadah in order to buy weapons, the president of Bosnia presented the manuscript at a community Seder in 1995.

"Afterwards, the manuscript was restored through a special campaign financed by the United Nations and the Bosnian Jewish community in 2001, and went on permanent display at the museum in December 2002" (Wikipedia article on Sarajevo Haggadah, accessed 03-23-2009).
The Oldest Sephardic
Haggadah

If this Wikipedia article is correct - and it probably is more reliable than GB's fictional account - the folio pages were neither goat, nor  alpine sheep - but calfskin!  Another reminder that this is fiction!

Did you notice this, JoanK? -

"Its pages are stained with wine— evidence that it was used at many Passover Seders."

[Gumtree]

Thanks everyone for your kind birthday greetings. They made my day. Thank you all.

The poem really intrigues me in relation to what GB is telling usbecause although,   the poem cites a goat the process for preparing the skin was much the same in 12th century as it was at the end of the 15th when our fictional Ben Shoushan sat down to pen the texts. All the things GB tells us about are right there in Ari the Learned's Recipe - soaking the skin in lime - stretching to dry slowly - paring the residual fat and blood vessels - and the final rubbing with pumice and chalk until smooth. Though there are differences between vellum and parchment the underlying process was the same whether the animal was goat, sheep or calf.

Babi You asked where I found the Icelandic recipe book - the answer is, in Australia !  Actually, a friend who is a cartographer unearthed it years ago - he was researching the parchments and inks used in early mapmaking. I had to hunt around my files to find the copy I took. 

Another piece of trivia: did you know that the Degrees issued by the University of Glasgow are on a parchment made from goat skin. Fact!

 

[JoanP]

Good morning, Gum!  We were just posting at the same time.  Glad you had a happy start to your new year!  Hope you're  feeling 50 again!
You jogged my memory - reminding me that my son's diploma from Washington and Lee University here in Virginia - is made of sheepskin.  Fact!  It required a special and more expensive mounting or framing - I guess that's why I remember that.
 
You know, it is Brooks'  fiction that brings us a woman, a young untrained artist, and a Moorish, Muslim as the illuminator of the stunning illustrations in the book.  I thought you might like to read this article - be sure to click the link to see the photos of the facsimile pages taken in 1996.  I think 100 facsimile pages were made.  

Here's an article that addresses matter of the the illustrator of the haggadah -

"According to the venerable Jewish historian, Cecil Roth, "it would seem probable that the illuminator of the Sarajevo Haggadah was a Jew." because of his "cognizance and sympathy for the text." Other details such as the tendency of individual panels to narrate from right to left (Lot flees leftward and Abraham walks left towards the Akeidah) echo Hebrew reading and point to a Jewish artist. The sophisticated integration of midrashic and biblical material and local Jewish costumes of the time (hooded gowns characteristic of Barcelonan Jewry) reinforce this view. "
http://richardmcbee.com/sarajevohaggadah.htm

But we'd better get back to Seville and GB's fiction -

[PatH]

Gumtree, I really enjoyed the poem, especially after having just read about the process.  Was Ari the Wise's text prose?

I read something amusing about the feathers.  Left- and right- winged feathers have opposite curves.  If you are right-handed, it is the left-wing feather that, when made into a pen, will curve away from your face and not tickle your eyebrow as you bend over your work.

[JoanK]

JOANP: yes, it made me happy to see that scholars think the winestains mean that the Haggadah was actually used in Seders: I like to think of families sitting around the table with that beautiful book. Four ritual glasses of wine are drunk during the ceremony-- it wouldn't be surprising if by the fourth glass some wine was spilled.

The link to the discussion of the pictures is amazing (I've been using that word too much these last few days, but this discussion IS amazing!) I need hours to study it. One note: if you want to follow his description of the paintings, remember the order in which they are read: the first two paintings are on the RIGHT-HAND page (not the left-hand page as in an English text).

[JoanK]

GUMTREE: how lucky you are to have access to such a document. I would love to hear more about it.

[JoanK]

QUESTIONS FOR THE AUTHOR:

I notice that several of the sources we consulted place the origin of the Haggadah around 1350, more that a century before you do. Is this a matter of scholarly debate?

Was the emir in the White hair section based on an historical figure: either the Christian Ferdinand, or an actual emir?

[JoanK]

If you saw a weird message here, that was me. I thought I was posting in Title Mania, one of our literary games. I removed it.

I don't know if the emira is based on Isabella or not. I put that in a question for GB, above.

I'm fascinated by Zahra being asked to draw a garden on a piece of grain. I wonder if suchfine art work was really being done. Artists in the group: would it be possible to do that with a brush as fine as one cat hair?