Hare with Amber Eyes, The ~ Edmund de Waal ~ February Book Club Online

[Frybabe]

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.

the HARE with AMBER EYES
A FAMILY'S CENTURY OF ART AND LOSS
by EDMUND de WAAL

"In The Hare with Amber Eyes, Edmund de Waal unfolds the story of a remarkable family and a tumultuous century. Sweeping yet intimate, it is a highly original meditation on art, history, and family, as elegant and precise as the netsuke themselves.When the Nazis took over Vienna, the family's loyal maid Anna simply hid these miniature works of art in her mattress, some 264 pieces depicting turtles and tigers and rats, a boy with a helmet and samurai sword, a naked woman and an octopus, a hare with amber eyes. Edmund de Waal eventually inherited the collection, and it serves to link the various parts of his story as he traces how the netsuke pass from one family member to the next."  Edmund de Waal click to enlarge

                                                                                                                       

Discussion Schedule: Feb. 1-3           Prologue Feb. 4-8          Part One ~ Paris ~ 1871-1899 Feb. 9-13         Part Two ~ Vienna ~ 1899-1938 Feb. 14-18       Part Three ~ Vienna ~ 1938-1947 Feb. 19-23       Part Four ~ Tokyo ~ 1947-2001 Feb. 24-28      Coda ~ Tokyo, Odessa, London ~ 2009

For Your Consideration
February Feb. 24-28
Coda ~ Tokyo, Odessa, London 2001-2009

De Waal calls the last section of the book, his "Coda."  What does this mean?
 What  do we learn in the Coda of his story?

35.  Jiro

 Why did Edmund return to Tokyo 15 years after his uncle's death? Was there a reason he brought the newspaper clipping of the sale of the diamond-studded Ephrussi-Rothschild Faberge egg to show Jiro?  To impress him?

36.  An Astrolabe, A Menzula, A Globe

  ~ The de Waal brothers returned to Odessa, to find the city where the Efrussi famly started. Do they find anything of the family here?

  ~ What causes Edmund to question what his book is really about - his family, himself, or the small Japanese things?

  ~ "I realize how wrong I've been." What effect did this "family archive" in the envelope found in Iggy's flat  and the yellow seder armchair chair in the synagogue have on Edmund?  How does he regard Odessa now, after this visit?
 
37. YELLOW/Gold/RED

~ What are some of the questions the visit brings up? Should the story begin in the shtetl in the Ukraine, not Odessa?
~ Edmund is ready to finish the story now?
~ Should the netsuke stay in Japan?  How does de Waal answer this question?  How do the netsuke tie in with the Ephrussi family's vagabonding?

Question from the Publisher

~Edmund originally thought that all the Ephrussi "vagabonding" stemmed from a desire to develop culturally and grow from the provincialism of Odessa. But he realized that Odessa itself was a very culturally rich city. Why do you think it was so important for the Ephrussis to send tendrils of their families to different cities?

Questions and Comments from you, our readers

Related Links:
link to Ephrussi family tree
Ephrussi family photos
Edmund de Waal at the Palais (YouTube)

DIscussion Leaders: JoanP & Marcie

Ice Station Zebra is one of my all time favorite movies, but I never read the book.

I don't think the war devastation in Japan was publicized near as much as in Europe.

[JoanP]

No, I don't think so either, Fry.  I think news of Tokoyo's desctruction was overshadowed by the total devastation of Nagasaki and Hiroshima.

On August 6, 1945, during World War II (1939-45), an American B-29 bomber dropped the world’s first deployed atomic bomb over the Japanese city of Hiroshima. The explosion wiped out 90 percent of the city and immediately killed 80,000 people; tens of thousands more would later die of radiation exposure. Three days later, a second B-29 dropped another A-bomb on Nagasaki, killing an estimated 40,000 people. Japan's Emperor Hirohito announced his country's unconditional surrender in World War II in a radio address on August 15, citing the devastating power of "a new and most cruel bomb."

I remember seeing photos of Hiroshima today - I'll try to find one:

Amazing, isn't it?  The last known survivor died very recently at 93. He must have witnessed the revival of these two cities since 1945 - as Iggie did in Japan.      http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2010/jan/06/hiroshima-nagasaki-survivor-dies

It struck me when reading of Iggie's arrival in Tokyo as it was in the process of rebuilding - much resembled Charles Ephrussi's family as settling in Paris as it was being rebuilt - and Viktor Ephrussi's family rebuilding their lives  in Vienna...  He probably knew his family history - starting over, settling in a new place was in his nature.

[JoanP]

Waafer, you've read this book twice now... I'm almost finished with first reading!  You are doing just fine.  Please do return for future discussions.  I think you'll really like "The End of Your Life Book Club"   (click this link to the new discussion)-  You will probably get some ideas for future reading too!

So now we know how the netsuke was returned to Japan.  It makes sense that Iggie would have left his home and contents to Jiro.  And it makes sense that Jiro would decide to will the netsuke to Edmund.  I can't think of who else he would have left them to.  

Were you at all confused about the relationship between Iggie and Jiro?  I thought I understood that they were partners - until I read that Iggie had adopted Jiro as his son.  Why do you think he did that?  Did I miss something - again?

[Frybabe]

JoanP, it may have had something to do with inheritance laws that prompted Iggie to adopt Jiro. I remember reading of other such adoptions, mostly before WWI in Europe where there were strict inheritance and entitlement rules such as we saw in Downton Abbey.

[marcie]

Waafer, since you've read the book twice, you've probably noticed details that I overlooked. Please feel free to jump in and mention anything at all. We've got the rest of this month to talk about the book. I'm glad that you'll participate in other discussions too.

JoanP, thanks for posting those photos. You say "It struck me when reading of Iggie's arrival in Tokyo as it was in the process of rebuilding - much resembled Charles Ephrussi's family as settling in Paris as it was being rebuilt - and Viktor Ephrussi's family rebuilding their lives  in Vienna...  He probably knew his family history - starting over, settling in a new place was in his nature." That's a good point that I hadn't thought about.

I also perked up when Iggie adopted Jiro. I'm thinking the same as Frybabe that it must have had to do with inheritance laws. He wanted to leave his apartment and everything to Jiro and this was probably the easiest way (but it did seem a bit strange).

[JudeS]

Iggie and Jiro were partners. Because Gay marriage is not legal in Japan, Iggie found a clever way around it.
He really wanted to make sure his Life partner inherited all that was coming to him.All that had been his.

Jiro too was a loving and good man and wanted the Netsuke to remain in Iggie's family. Edmund was the obvious candidate. He picked well. Without that inheritance we would never had this wonderful book and story.

Edmund took his inheritance very seriously and thus his life was changed. He and his family got the Netsuke  and the world got this marvelous history of a family and an age which was so full of world shaking events that it reverberates with all who read it.

[marcie]

Jude, you're right. Passing along the stories of the netsuke was very important to Edmund. I'm learning a lot reading about them. I confess that I don't think I'd ever heard of the Ephrussi family before I read the book.

I was struck by how condescending the Americans were to the Japanese after the War. They were characterized as childish and almost too "simple" to learn.

[JoanP]

I've been trying to understand the Japanese people both before and after the war, Marcie.  I've learned that the Emperor Hirohito had been on the throne since 1926...and remained Emperor of Japan until his death in 1989.

"The view promoted by both the Japanese Imperial Palace and the American occupation forces immediately after World War II portrayed Emperor Hirohito as a powerless figurehead behaving strictly according to protocol, while remaining at a distance from the decision-making processes."

"It was a good story line and suited the needs of both Japanese and Americans. If the emperor had been powerless to halt the warmongers in the army, how could ordinary Japanese have done so? Thus the people of Japan, like the Chinese or the Filipinos, could also be considered the victims of the militarists. Although there were some weaknesses and inconsistencies, the story came to be widely accepted in both the United States and Japan."

General MacArthur and the Emperor at Allied GHQ in Tokyo. September 17, 1945

De Waal presents a sympathetic portrait of the Japanese people...leaderless in the hands, at the mercy of the American occupation...doing whatever to survive, to make a living at a time when there was little housing, food, fuel, clothing, overcrowding...  The Americans would see them as "simple," "childish," weak and worse..."vulgar" - "hedonistic" in their attempts to survive.

I love de Waal's contrast here, describing Iggie's entrance into this moral climate "with his small attache case with ivory monks..."

So how does Jiro fit into this picture? 

[marcie]

Wow, Joan. I had missed that. I now see how the characterization of the emperor and people as powerless served the aims of the Japanese too.

The surviving people were actually quite resilient, peeling off layers to survive financially and transforming themselves to cope with the changed world.  I don't know if there were any "Westernization" influences before the War. If not, it seems a very rapid change for the younger generations to take so quickly to the music, dress and pop-culture of the West. I noticed the detail that the young office workers instituted a culture of tardiness as well.

Jiro shared Iggie's love of opera and liked jazz as well. I'll have to go back to see what other details I might have missed about Jiro in his younger days.

[JudeS]

To understand Japan's culture after WW2 there is no better source than Kenzaburo Oe (1935-  ).
He won the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1994.

I found hid books wonderful and he remains one of my all-time favorite authors.

Through his books you learn that there is little difference between the modern Japanese people and us.

Understanding the japanese people  who went to war againdt us is another matter and I have no suggestions for that.

[marcie]

Thank you, Jude, for the information about Kenzaburo Oe. I had not heard of him.

Wikipedia says that "Ōe was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1994 for creating "an imagined world, where life and myth condense to form a disconcerting picture of the human predicament today" " He sounds like someone I would like to read.

[JudeS]

Marcie
If you do read Oe start with  "The Silent Cry", his masterpiece.
I think I have read all of his books.  I was really taken with this author . He taught at Stanford for a few years.

Many of his books deal with a fictionalized account of his brain damaged son. In real life this child, now a man of 44, became a composer savant whose C.D.s are very well known in Japan. It is an amazing true life part of Oe's world.

[marcie]

Wow, Jude. He's written quite a few books. My library has a number of them, including THE SILENT CRY. THanks for the recommendation to start with it.

[Babi]

    I suppose you would have to say, JOAN, that for the Jewish people most of their
history consists of starting over in a new place. Their resiliency is remarkable,
isn't it?   Can someone explain why Ignace is now 'Leo' Ephrussi?  I must have missed 
that somewhere along the line.

  Jiro did have family, but we don't know how close a relationship they maintained.
I think I remember he was the middle child of five, a family of shoe manufacturers.
We don't know what they thought about his relationship with the 'gaijin'. I think FRYBABE's
suggestion is the most likely explanation.

  I suppose this is 'occupation' language.  A bit ironic, don't you think? "Democracy had come to Japan. The local and foreign press were censored."

   De Waal's analysis of why the Japanes are so good with delicate things,  so deft with their fingers, seems well thought out.  I had never considered that before, but it seems a very logical  conclusion that the smallness of their country, the handling of small things like chopsticks from childhood give them that delicacy of touch.  And his observation that they 'display their nature in finishing their work with delicate skill and scrupulous execution'  does explain why they are so successful in the world of modern electronics technology.

[marcie]

Babi, I believe that Iggie's full name was Ignace Leon von Ephruss. When he went to America he used a variation of his middle name.

Good pick up on the irony in those sentences: "Democracy had come to Japan. The local and foreign press were censored."  My interpretation is that the information about netsuke in Chapter 32 that de Waal quotes from a Japan Travel Bureau guide published in 1951, "that records 'valuable help given by Rear Admiral Benton W. Dekker, former commander of US Fleet Activities in Yokosuka..." is also in the same vein of irony. It's the American view of the talents of the "small," "child-like" Japanese people.

To follow up on the information you posted about Jiro's family, Jiro was part of "a prosperous and entreprenurial family." He studied at a University in Tokyo and when he met Leo Jiro was twenty-six and had just returned from three years studying at an American University on a scholarship. So it seems that he was a good match for Iggie as he was well-educated and shared Iggie's love of music, travel and fine food.

[JoanP]

I think it was Jude who pointed out several days ago, that de Waal's story is really about things, about the netsuke collection and how it passed hands until it reached him.  There is a whole lot more to the personal stories of the Ephrussis that he skims over in his pursuit of the netsuke story.  If Iggie wrote this book, we'd learn more of  his fascinating life  that finally led to his "adopting" Jiro.  I don't think it was soley to provide a secure home in Japan for the netsuke.

Iggie did write an article about  his collection - saying that it was "GOOD FORTUNE"  that had brought the netsuke back to Japan after three generations in Europe.

I can understand what you are saying about the "adoption" being a means of bequeathing his possessions to Jiro.  I can't help but wonder, though, what Jiro's big family in nearby Shizuoka thought of this - his own father and grandfather.   Did they even know about the adoption, or was it regarded as just so much legalese?    I am inclined to believe it was de Waal who drew his "Japanese uncle" into the family tree as Iggy's son.  Did you notice that on the tree?

I promise to get back to the netsukes' and their popularity in the 50's...just got sidetracked in Jiro's relationship with Iggie - quite an unusual one, don't you think?

    

[Frybabe]

In the process of seeing if I could find Iggie's article on the Netsuki if it was put up on the net somewhere I ran across something else entirely. I am still on the trail of the elusive Shey estate along the Vah River where they often spent time.

This does not really help, but it is kind of interesting nonetheless. It is a Shey family genealogy. The Shey's we are interested in are under baron Fredrich, almost half way down the page, also Emmy is listed farther down with her own paragraph (baroness Emmy (Emmi) Henrietta SCHEY von KOROMLA).  http://freepages.genealogy.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~prohel/names/misc/schey.html

Emmy's great(?)grandfather Frederich (and others) was from Kőszeg (formerly Guns), Hungary, which is south of Vienna. Nowhere near the Vah River. Emmy herself was born in Linz - Kövecses. Well, there is a Linz in Austria and Korvesces is in Slovinia. Maybe they weren't surem where she was bprn because it looks like they weren't sure of the exact birth date either. None of this helps me pinpoint the estate.

As for the disposition of the estate, the Germans managed to leave the Jews in that area alone until late in the war. The Russians "liberated" the area and nationalized all the private property. Considering it was a farm estate, it probably became some kind of government run farm commune. The Vah River, BTW, is a major tributary of the Danube. Best I can tell, it is noted for good fishing and boating.

[Frybabe]

Jude, I was just thinking (always a bad sign   ). Would you like to nominate Kenzaburo Oe's The Silent Cry for a future book discussion? You've talked about his work before. I'd like to read some of it, but with all my other TBRs it isn't likely to happen unless we do a book discussion.

Wouldn't you know it, my library has four of his books, but not that one.

[marcie]

JoanP, I didn't notice that Jiro was on the family tree as Iggie's son. That would make him de Waal's "cousin."  

Frybabe, you didn't find the information you ultimately want but good sleuthing!

[JudeS]

Frybabe
Would I suggest The Silent Cry for a group read?
No , I wouldn't.  It is too dark and depressing. At least I found it so. That doesn't take away from it's worth but not a good discussion book.
If one of you reads Oe's  "A Personal Matter" and enjoys it , that might be a better choice since it is easier to digest and much less painfull. I would need to hear that someone else beside myself thinks it is worth discussing.

This writer is steeped in his own culture and you have to take a big step to join him.  Once you are there it becomes easier
and easier to assimilate the material and understand the world the author is writing about.

[Frybabe]

Thanks for the input Jude. My library has these Oe books:
The Changling
A Quiet Life
Hiroshima Notes
Nip the Buds, Shoot the Kids

The last listed looks like a title for a book of poetry or some kinds of humor. It's not. Still it looks interesting , except that there isn't a happy ending. I didn't check to see what the others are about.

[Babi]

  Ah, thank you Marcie. I had forgotten about that middle name. I also needed
to be corrected about his age when he met Iggie. I was thinking it was much
earlier, when he was about 18 and in college. Not sure where I got that idea.

     Iggie in Japan has me worried now.  "Every night he had drinks with clients."  Then there is a listing of four or five different bars where he would 'have drinks' with clients.   Even one drink per bar would be quite a lot,  and we don't know if he  had only one drink with each of them.  Every night? 

  De Waal is sarcastic about all the books on Japan written by people who spent maybe a year there.  "Japan--my, what an odd country!  A country in transition.  Vanishing traditions. Enduring traditions.  Essential verities. Seasons in. Myopia of the Japanese. Love of detail of. Dexterity. Self-sufficiency of. Childishness of.  Inscrutibility of. "    Okay.. I feel for all intents and purposes I know all that those books have to say, and don't feel a need to read any of them. 

[JoanP]

Well, yes, Marcie...Elizabeth is Jiro's aunt.  That makes him her son Victor's cousin - and then Edmund would be a second cousin, wouldn't he?

 "What do you think of Iggie's two decisions after he returns from visiting Vienna in 1973?"
 Iggy and Jiro had traveled the world together. But hadn't been back to Vienna since he left in 1936. Jiro goes with him to see where Iggy had come from. This must have been a moving experience fo rIggy- as it had been for Elizabeth.  Can't help but wonder where Anna is at the time of this visit.  She isn't mentioned after Elizabeth's visit in 1945. 

 De WaaI writes that Iggy made two decisions when they returned from that visit to Vienna...and tells us the two decisions were connected.  To adopt Jiro - and to revoke his American citizenship.  I think I understand why the second..., but what was it about the trip to Vienna that made him decide to adopt Jiro? And how were the two decisions connected?  There was nothing in Vienna that Iggy - or Jiro as his son would inherit.  What did you think of this?

[JoanP]

Babi has me thinking now - about Iggy and the many bars. If he's living the life of the "real Japan" I'm wondering what the difference is between those he seems to consider the tourists.  Is it the type of bars he's frequenting?

I've also been thinking about the fraternization that is taking place in Japan in those years immediately following the war - among the Japanese, the Americans and the Europeans de Waal writes about.  Didn't you find this surprising?  Would you expect to see this in post-war Germany?  Of course Japan is occupied - but the friendliness among the former enemies makes me wonder... 

[JoanK]

The "drinking with clients" seems to be pretty common in Japan: part of their culture. I admit, though, it does sound like a worrying amount of alcohol, if Jiro doesn't know how to control it.

[Frybabe]

I am wondering what they were drinking at the bars. Rice was scarce after the war, so the Japanese government discouraged making alcoholic beverages from it. Still, there was some around and probably lots of foreign imports.

Japanese beer anyone? A little about the post war occupation and restrictions: http://www.kirinholdings.co.jp/english/company/history/group/05.html

[marcie]

JoanP, you write
"De WaaI writes that Iggy made two decisions when they returned from that visit to Vienna...and tells us the two decisions were connected.  To adopt Jiro - and to revoke his American citizenship.  I think I understand why the second..., but what was it about the trip to Vienna that made him decide to adopt Jiro? And how were the two decisions connected?  There was nothing in Vienna that Iggy - or Jiro as his son would inherit.  What did you think of this?"

I've been thinking about the two decisions. It may be because there was nothing left in Vienna for either Iggie or Jiro to inherit that Iggie made the decision to adopt Jiro. The Nazis had created a legal system with lots of paper that overwrote the ownership of Iggie and his family's property. It was the legal paperwork that determined ownership. Perhaps Iggie wanted to make sure that Jiro had the legal system behind him; hence, the decision to adopt.

There was nothing left in Vienna for Iggie. Others were living in his house. It was no longer his home. He had made a new life for himself and Jiro in Japan. It seems from de Waal's descriptions that he considered Japan his home now. (Do I remember correctly that de Waal says that Iggie had spent more time in Japan than he had in Vienna?) He likely didn't want to be an "American" in Japan-- identified with a condescending conqueror, especially over the person he loved most. I think he was acknowledging his creation of a new home and new family.

[JoanP]

The  idea of the American occupation forces - with no beer on a Saturday night!  It boggles the mind! An interesting article, Fry.  I noted this -

"The Korean War, which broke out in June 1950, triggered an economic boom in Japan, which provided supplies and services for U.S. forces. Japanese beer companies also benefited from the boom and sharply increased production during these years."

In the "Real Japan" chapter, Iggy has become a "long term Tokyo resident.  He loved Tokyo by the early sixties. That seems to be the time he was drinking so heavily with clients in one bar after another.

Marcie - I went back and reread the passage about Iggy's return visit to Vienna after all those years - and decided to adopt Jiro.  De Waal writes that Iggy's decisions makes him wonder "what belonging to a place means."  He writes that "Viktor was a Russian in Vienna for fifty years, then Austrian, then a citizen of the Reich, and then stateless.  Elizabeth kept Dutch citizenship in England for fifty years.  And Iggy was Austrian, then American then an Austrian living in Japan."  You assimilate, but you need somewhere else to go.  You keep your passport to hand."  

It sounds to me as if he's decided that he's not an American, he's not going back to America.  Does this mean then that  he considers himself an Austrian living in Japan?  Still not clear how this is connected to his relationship with Jiro.  Does adopting Jiro make him the son of an Austrian?  In a way, is Jiro an Austrian living in Japan?...a Japanese man with legal connections to Austria?

Now I'm wondering what would have happened to Iggy's "estate" in Japan, had he not adopted Jiro?  Who would have been the next of kin?  Where would the netsuke collection be today?

[Babi]

  Elizabeth tried to find some trace of Anna but was unsuccessful. Considering how
thorough Elizabeth was in everything she did, I doubt very much if anyone else could
have found her. But I think we all liked Anna so much, we'd love to know more about
her.
  Just speculating, JOAN, but perhaps going back to his roots and remembering his
heritage and the destruction that took it all away...maybe he just wanted to pass
on that heritage. Yes, he had relatives, but Jiro was closest to him in all things.
He could be sure Jiro understood, and appreciated, all that it meant.

    So what is the 'real' Japan. "Getting to the whole and untouched means getting
out of Tokyo: Japan starts where the sounds of the city end."  We're in the sixties
now.  The occupation is long over.  But it would seem that Tokyo is permanently
Westernized.

  Impossible to guess what might have happened to the netsuke.  I'm just grateful they
survived.  I love that apt description,  'sculpture for the hand'. 
 

[JoanP]

...And of course no one would have the netsuke today if it hadn't been for Anna - hiding them in her mattress for all those years.  You have to wonder how hard any one of them looked for Anna - Elizabeth, Iggy - or Edmund de Waal, for that matter. He didn't even think to ask her last name. Don't you think it would be on record somewhere?  She just seems to them to be a minor character in their family's history.  But I would think that she'd be important to de Waal in his story of the netsuke's history.

"Sculpture for the hand" Finally Iggy has researched the value of the signed netsuke..When De Waal receives them, they have little stickers identifying each one.  I found a picture of the Tomokazu tiger...and his tortoises. But they keep eluding me when I try to posts them here.

Here it is - the boxwood tiger. De Waal says this tiger is the "star" of the Ephrussi netsuke collection - Can you feel it in your hand?

[JoanP]

Today we move on to the last section - but there was a lot more in Part IV that we skimmed over.  Please feel free to refer back to any of those pages...

De Waal calls the last section of the book, his "Coda."  What is a coda supposed to be? Is it a conclusion, an iteration of what has been said already?  Or is something added to the story?  Was his book finished when he returned to Odessa at the end?

Maybe we need to reread these last pages before answering this question... How difficult
Ult it mus be to end a book like this!

[Babi]

 A charming netsuke, but it doesn't look much like the tigers I know. Are there
tigers in Japan?  I wonder what the carver was using for a model?

   I'm not sure I understand De Waal's compulsion to visit every place connected with his family.  All he finds in Odessa is a single iron balcony with the Ephrussi double-E and corn ears. It's important to him to touch that.  I think that this search has become an obsession. It seems he could have learned as much at this stage, at much less cost,  by staying home and studying all the material his Dad kept turning up.

[JoanP]

I think you're right, Babi.  There wasn't much left of the house, the house in ruins - a "mess,"  Edmunc writes.  But where you and Edmund's brother, Thomas, gave up finding traces of the Ephrussis, I thinik Edmund and I are seeing the Ephrussi legacy very much alive in Odessa, causing Edmund to write, "The Efrussi boys are still here."  This discovery seems to be causing Edmund to rethink his first conclusion as to why the family left Odessa.

Maybe we need to read more into these concluding chapters, which take place on the author's return trips between 2001 and 2009.  Before the book is published.  He wants to check his facts, to get this right.

First stop - Tokyo, where he visits Jiro for three days, going over details.  Jiro has left the house exactly as it was when Iggy died 15 years ago.  What was the point?  Did he learn anything new?  Was it worth the trip? 

[JudeS]

One of the questions or anomalies that de Waal doesn't really address is the Efrussi switch from Judaism to Church of England.
This comes to the forefront on pages 347-8 where he writes:

"When she died two years later my father, a clergyman in the Church of England, stood inhis Benedictine-black,
rabbinical-black-cassock and recited the KADDISH for his mother in the parrish church near her nursing home."

The author has no comment on this happening. He attaches no explanation why the Jewish prayer for the dead, ( perhaps in Hebrew since it is never said in another language)was said by his minister father.

Perhaps he too, like myself, thought,this is another of life's strange anomalies, let it be.

[marcie]

Babi, I don't have the artistic gifts that de Waal has but he seems like a very visual and tactile person. He can't connect with his ancestors unless he sees and touches the places where they lived.

It seems odd to me that despite his desire to come so close to them by visiting their homes, he several times says that he is reluctant to read their letters or other personal materials, thinking it an invasion of their privacy.

[Babi]

  It appears the Jewish Ephrussi's have become fully integrated.  Elizabeth is a
Dutch citizen happily attending church in London.  Edmund's father is an
Anglican clergyman.  Still, when his mother died, he stood in his cassock in
her parish church, and recited the Kaddish for her.  How does one manage this
basic division in one's life?

 A very good point, MARCIE. I can see how tactile contact would be an instinctive
need for a man whose passion is making pottery. Perhaps his reluctance to read
the letters is because those people have become very real to him. It has become
more than a research into the past. They have become a part of his own identity.

[JoanP]

"It appears the Jewish Ephrussi's have become fully integrated."  Babi

"He can't connect with his ancestors unless he sees and touches the places where they lived." Marcie

"One of the questions or anomalies that de Waal doesn't really address is the Efrussi switch from Judaism to Church of England. The author has no comment on this happening. He attaches no explanation why the Jewish prayer for the dead " Jude

******************************************

We're left with the above questions...going into the Coda at the end of the book.  (I keep asking myself the same question - what is a coda? A conclusion, an iteration of what has been said already?  Or is something added to the story?  )

I agree with you,  de Waal has no trouble describing things - specifically things he can see and touch.  And he can understand his ancestors by what he can touch - and observe.  Beyond that, he leaves us with the anomalies Jude refers to.

Maybe we are seeing a change in his understanding of the Ephrussi - the Efrussi ancestors - in his return visit to Odessa right before his book goes to the publisher.  

On this trip, he seems to see beyond the crumbling Efrussi mansion - he mentions the Efrussi orphanage still operating in Odessa, the library, the school for Jewish children - with the astrolabe(?), menzula (?), the globe donated by the Efrussi boys...  He sees the yellow sedar chair in the synagogue and thinks of Charles' chair...  (this can't be Charles' chair, is it?)

Do you remember the Ephrussis in Vienna - their near-complete assimilation there?  (Except for quiet (secret) donations, and recording births, deaths with the Rabbinate.)   The Jews of Odessa were not afraid to be Jews, to practice outwardly who they were.  Why did they leave?  Remember Goncourt's description of Charles the dancer?- "The Poles forgot Odessa, a city of pogroms..."

Edmund is beginning to think that Odessa was NOT where it all started for the Efrussis after all.  He begins to think that he ought to make a trip to the shtetl (?) in the Ukraine if he really wants to understand his ancestors.  But their town - Berdichev had been desroyed in the war...perhaps there was nothing left for him to touch there?

I'm trying to put all of this together - and think that in his indirect way, de Waal is trying to explain such anomalies as you've been noting.  
That old saying comes to mind - you can take the boy off the farm, but you can't take the farm out of the boy.  Or something like that.

[Frybabe]

Re: Coda. My impression is that it is something more than a mere summary or conclusion. It can include clarifications, updates and things like "oh, by the way, this is what happened to so and so after the conclusion of the book. I like Webster's definition.

2
1 a : a concluding musical section that is formally distinct from the main structure
b : a concluding part of a literary or dramatic work

2 : something that serves to round out, conclude, or summarize and usually has its own interest

I had assumed (dangerous) that a shtetl was a slum or very poor community. But now that you brought it up JoanP, I looked it up. Am I glad I did. Shtetl meas small town. Wikipedia has a nice little write up on it. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shtetl Once you get there, you might want to click on the Pale of Settlement link too. It is something else I didn't know, but was mentioned in the book.

[JoanP]

Thank you, Fry -  for following up with the meaning of Coda and also the Efrussi family's  roots in the shtetl in the Ukraine...
These are both important to de Waal's story, I think.  After reading his Coda at the end of the book , I have even more questions about the family's Jewish heritage.   I feel that he himself has interjected the personal with details of his immediate family - his grandmother and his father specifically.  When you think about it - the whole book is a testament to his family's roots in the Ukrainian shtetl.

From the link Fry brought to us:

The concept of shtetl culture is used as a metaphor for the traditional way of life of 19th-century Eastern European Jews. Shtetls are portrayed as pious communities following Orthodox Judaism, socially stable and unchanging despite outside influence or attacks. The Holocaust resulted in the disappearance of the vast majority of shtetls, through both extermination under Nazi occupation and exodus ...to the main cities of Russia, open to Jewish habitation since the fall of the Tsarist regime.

[JoanP]

 Here's a link and an interesting fact concerning the Efrussi family home, the shtetl of Berdychiv -

 "The banking industry was moved from Berdychiv to Odessa (a major port city) after 1850, and the town became impoverished again in a short period of time."
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Berdychiv

So, can we conclude that the family had to emigrate - to Odessa, a stopping point, before moving on the Vienna, Paris... Tokyo... London   de Waal recognizes Charles' sedar chair in Odessa, sees Viktor entering births/deaths in the Rabbinate (?), tells us of Viktor's daughter requesting rabbinical studies and then de Waal's father, Victor, reading the Kaddish at his mother's funeral.

No wonder de Waal is at a loss to explain to the old scholar in Odessa what his book is about.  At this point he writes that he is no longer sure whether it is his own personal story - or a book about the little Japanese netsuke he started out to write about.

How do you feel about the question -  Should the netsuke have stayed in Japan?  Didn't they seem quite at home there,   in the land from which they came?  I think I'm beginning  to see the parallel between the Ephrussi family's wandering -  and the netsuke collection.  There is no returning home, is there - unless to the true place of origin?