The Shawl is a great insight into the lives of three Jewish characters in the marching their way to the concentration camps. One thing that confused me throughout the story is Stella's relation to Rosa and Magda. Was she Rosa's daughter too? Or was she Rosa's sister? I really cannot tell.
It surprised me that there was not a lot of insight into anybody else's character but Stella's. The reader can pick up that Rosa does not see Stella fondly. In fact, the narrator states, "she was jealous of Magda" and "Stella wanted to be wrapped in a Shaw". These two examples are interesting for two reasons. One, because the point of view is third person omniscient, which means we know the characters feelings. Second, because Stella is made out to be a selfish boney child with no feelings for others while Rosa is made out to be a saint in hopes to save her baby with a magical shawl.
The shawl itself is also something to be discussed. Not only is the shawl a symbol for saving Magda, but also it is a symbol for hope for Rosa. The shawl also shields Magda from the Nazis in two ways. Physically, the shawl hides her, and the shawl serves as her pacifier to keep her quiet. Lastly, the shawl serves as Rosa's pacifier when the fence electrocutes Magda. It saves Rosa herself from being shot because of any noise she would have made in response.
What I love about this reading is the strong connection between mothers in daughter in such an extreme time of struggle. You can tell how connected Rose is because she gives every ounce of her food to Magda and because of that her milk runs dry. What I do dislike about this article is the way the author makes Stella out to be some sort of monster. Stella, only 14, is still quite helpless herself. In the passage it says, "Then Stella took the shawl away and made Magda die". This sentence may be true in a way but not all the blame can be pointed at Stella. What about the fact that Rose never tried to giver her away? Or the fact that she never should have let Stella take the shawl, the only protection Magda had against the Nazis?
In the larger context of things, what I took from the story, is that above all else guard your relationships with your children. You can lose somebody within seconds, which is what the electric fence symbolized for me. Secondly, there's often nothing you can do to make it better. Rose shoved the shawl in her mouth because by speaking out she would have made it worse for herself.
What it says about human nature is that when a woman becomes a mother, all other self-needs are forgotten. For example, she felt no hunger. She was wasting away at the cost of her child that she knew would not live. She was even astonished Magda even learned to walk.
Erika Halburian To respond to your question Allison, what I got out of reading the story was that Stella was Rosa’s other daughter therefore making her Magda’s older sister. Stella seamed to be selfish but since they are in a concentration camp I can see where caring for oneself is a necessity. Yes she took the shawl from Magda but she too was left with hardly anything to keep herself warm.
I found the symbol of the shawl very interesting as well. The shawl itself was almost it’s own character in the story because it played just as much of a role as the characters played. The shawl shielded Magda from the Nazi’s, kept her alive by feeding her the milk, and then might have also been a factor in her death. Magda was looking for the shawl that caused her to be seen by the Nazi solider. At the same time the shawl did act as barrier for Rosa’s shrieks that would have gotten her killed.
I would also like to respond how you alluded to the fact that when a woman becomes a mother her needs are forgotten. I agree completely that, which was the case in the story. She could also was prepared that Magda was going to die. She mentioned that Magda would die several times throughout the story before the actual incident occurred.
In response to Allison’s post, to be completely honest, I agree with everything you posted. To start, I think that Stella was definitely jealous of Magda and Rosa’s relationship and more of Magda than of the shawl itself. In fact, I think that the shawl represented the jealousy because Stella longed to have that shawl and it was probably in a sense covering up her longing for the attention Magda received. The shawl played a huge role in the story. I agree with the idea that the narrator made Stella’s character out to be a monster. The way she was written is described as a jealous child but I think her behavior was deeper and had a deeper meaning to it. I also didn’t completely understand what was meant by “Stella making Magda die”. Did Magda physically die? Because in the next line she was alive. I think the fact that Stella stole the shawl made her character look bad, but the entire way that her character was written was in an emotion provoking way. Every time Stella spoke or did anything, I would feel some sort of emotion. I agree with your comment that the electric fence symbolized losing somebody within seconds because Rosa only cared about protecting her child and did whatever she could to keep her alive just like she did whatever she could to avoid that fence. I agree with the comment that this story dealt a lot with mother daughter relationships. The relationship between Rosa and Magda is a strong one. Rosa does anything she can to show her love to Magda, but it is completely the opposite for Stella. It definitely made me wonder why Stella was so unloved; the narrator did a good job of creating that lingering thought. All in all, I agree with your analysis and it made me understand the story more from reading it.
Jasmine Cox At first, I was also confused about the relationship between Stella and the other two girls, but as I read more I believe that Stella is most likely Rosa's first born. That also gives more of an explanation for the way Stella is treated and how Rosa talks about her. Even though it's terrible to think about, sometimes, the first born's needs are put behind the younger child's. Especially since Magda is so young and they are living in such horrible conditions anyways, Rosa is probably ridiculously stressed and tired. It's still no excuse to call Stella such names as 'cannibal' and say things about how she probably wants to eat Magda. Even though the majority of the story is rested on Stella being the 'bad guy', at the beginning of the story, Rosa and Stella describe Magda as being "one of THEIR babies." This part confused me quite a lot, especially being in the very beginning of the story. How did Rosa end up with an Aryan baby? I guess that's beside the point, just a thought I had as to why they kind of referred to her in such a distant way, like Magda wasn't a part of their family. I agree with everything you say about the shawl, I just feel that it was a symbol of security, in every sense of the word, for every character.
First, I would like to thank Allison for writing such a clear and straight to the point response. She wrote some interesting and informational points in her response.
I also was wondering what role Stella played in this short story. She was always around and was the enemy of the story. Ok, yes she took the shawl from Magda, but what was her purpose. She did add conflict but I didn’t understand much of her character. And I do agree with the narrator and Allison that the conflict was because of jealously, but I felt like there was more conflict in Stella and Rosa relationship.
Allison also gave an interesting point on the symbolization of the shawl in this short story. I thought the shawl symbolized comfort and security to Magda. And a scapegoat for Rosa, if anything went wrong with her daughter then blames it on the shawl. What I appreciate from Allison is I was a little confused about Magda death, and she explained it with great detail. I do agree with Allison calling the shawl a pacifier for the daughter and mother.
I also agree with Allison, about the strong mother and daughter connection. The author makes it vey appartent and you can tell the mother tried to do her best to keep her daughter alive. I understand that, this story was during a rough time, but I didn’t like how negative the mother was sometimes during the story. It seemed like she had no hope for her daughter and kept thinking it was “time for Magda to die"
Allison, I agreed with mostly everything you said in your post. When it comes to Stella, it really was never made clear to us whether she was Rosa’s daughter or sister or any sort of relation. For all we know they could’ve been acquaintances from the same village and amongst the mass confusion, a familiar face became a best friend. Going to the shawl, I think everything you mentioned was very true. My interpretation of the shawl was also an escape and a blinder of sorts. Magda, this tiny little infant, was covered by a shawl that kept her warm and secluded from the chaos around her. She was ignorant to her surroundings and ignorance truly is bliss. I think Stella was jealous of the shawl for all the reasons you mentioned and because she had to face all this terror while Magda resided in safety and remained a ghost to the world and the Nazis. Concerning the relationship between Rosa and Magda, I got the same reaction as you. Rosa was willing to do anything to keep her child alive and have her live on. It’s amazing how she kept her head in such dark and cruel times whereas others, such as Stella, were only concerned for their well being and if they made it through these times. Cynthia Ozick effectively portrayed the unbreakable bond between parent and offspring.
Chynna Humphrey In response to your first question, I took from the story that both Magda and Stella are Rosa’s daughters. Though it was kind of unclear at first, after re-reading the story, I’m sure this is the case. I think that Stella’s jealousy came out of the fact that she was the ignored daughter. Rosa cared so fondly for Magda and kept her so safe and warm; whereas, just because Stella was older, she had to fend for herself and she didn’t get as much attention from her mother. I agree that the shawl was a representation of hope for survival and protection because it was the protective barrier that shielded Magda from the Nazis. However, I also saw the shawl as a symbol of naivety and immaturity. Stella is forced to be mature and fend for herself in walking to the concentration camps because he mother is so focused on protecting Magda. Magda, constantly covered by the shawl, is safe from danger and cannot see the brutal world around her as she’s carried around with, essentially, a blindfold over her eyes. It’s not until Stella takes the shawl from Magda that she sees the world cruelty of the world. Her death occurs because the symbolic shawl is no longer hiding her from the realities of the world they were living in.
Kayleigh Koskan In response to Allison, I agree with most of what you said. I too am confused as to what the relationship between Rosa and Stella is. Stella is jealous of Madge throughout the story but I feel like there is more to the jealousy than just over the shawl. I think Stella might be jealous between the relationship that Madge and Rosa had if you are to assume that Stella is Rosas older daughter. What I’m uncertain about in your reaction is when you say that you loved the strong connection between mother and daughter and that the moral of the story was to guard your relationships with your children, if Stella was also her daughter then why didn’t Rosa ever do anything to protect her? Why was she so disgusted at the older girl? Also, if that was not her daughter and Madge was her only child and she was to protect her then would it not make sense to continue that goal and help her as she is getting electrocuted? If it were my child dying I would have run to be with them. If that’s all you have left during this hard time then why think twice about being murdered when your only means of living is already dead? This story was just weird to me. I don’t really understand Rosas way of thinking but I believe it would have been clearer to me if I had known the relationship between Rosa and Stella.
Natalie Palmer - In Dreams Begin Responsibilities I find Delmore Schwartz’s narrator to be a very astute and perceptive person, yet he is full of regrets and has too strong a focus on the past instead of his own future. His character comes across as broken and hurting, seeming to despise his own existence. Through the observations he makes of his parents, we actually learn a lot more about the narrator than we do his mother and father, of which he spends a great time describing. His opinions shed more light on his own person than those of his parents.
He begins his inner conflict when he has this almost out of body feeling where he is in a theater, watching his parent’s first meeting unfold before his eyes. His observations are laden with his opinions and discrepancies with his father. When he describes his father walking across the street, he pointedly describes his tie. “His clothes are newly pressed and his tie is too tight in his high collar.” He takes the time to show his father’s attempt at looking rich and refined. He furthers this point by pointing out, “He jingles the coins in his pockets, thinking of the witty things he will say.” I can almost hear the narrator mocking his father, using the word “witty” to mean “pretentious.” But moving away from that is how he reacts to their actions. He gets angry, he cries, all showing what his past must have been like. How difficult was his childhood that he wished that he had never been born? That his parents had never been married? “…it was then that I stood up in the theatre and shouted: "Don't do it. It's not too late to change your minds, both of you. Nothing good will come of it, only remorse, hatred, scandal, and two children whose characters are monstrous." These emotions, remorse, hatred, and scandal all tell of what happened to his parents. Wishing they had never been married, the mounting hatred as the years pass, and the possible scandal of adultery. The last sentence of the quote is the load-bearing sentence of the entire story, meaning that it is such a strong and unexpected dialogue and without it, the story would not be as complete. To consider that he and his sibling are monsters implies so much about his character. Is he selfish, angry, possibly immoral?
The narrator’s thought process drastically takes a turn where, at the end, he seems to take back the load-bearing sentence when his parents are in the psychic’s booth. After the narrator’s father finds the entire situation “intolerable,” his father gets up and leaves his mother in the booth on her own. The narrator yells at the screen saying, "What are they doing? Don't they know what they are doing? Why doesn't my mother go after my father? If she does not do that, what will she do? Doesn't my father know what he is doing?" So isn’t this saying that he does want them to get together? Is he trying to hope that the future could be changed, even though the past has already happened?
This makes the narrator such a deep and complex character, showing his multi-faceted personality. His mental tug-of-war is a part of his past, just as much as it may be in his future.
I agree whole-heartedly with your analysis of In Dreams Begin Responsibilities, Natalie. I noticed that you picked up on some of the confusion I felt as well when the narrator started shouting questions at the screen that made it seem like he didn’t want his parents to separate. Throughout the entire story, the narrator constantly belittles his father; revealing his arrogance, his greedy desires and lack of compassion—showing the audience his views on his father—but then says something like, “Why doesn’t my mother go after my father?” when he leaves her with the fortune-teller? It’s a bit puzzling because it seems as though the narrator changes his point right as the story is ending. But then, I thought, what if that’s what he meant to do? Not necessarily change the point, but show that the narrator may not truly want his life to be undone after all. As you mentioned, this story is about the narrator’s inner conflict. He begins by subtly making his want to be “anonymous” known and then reiterates the same thought a little farther into the story, calling himself “monstrous” but then, right before he awakes, he has this revelation that makes him question himself. When the usher hauls the narrator out of the theatre, he asks, “What are you doing?” This makes it clear to the reader that even though the story made it seem like it was about how his father wasn’t good for his mother and they should’ve never gotten together, what the narrator is actually doing is projecting his feelings of wishing he wasn’t born on to his parents’ relationship.
Kyndall Herman I also very much agree with what Natalee has to say. I did not pick up on what was really going on until we discussed the story in class, and I did feel as though the protagonist was focusing on his past and not so much into his future. He did in fact imply towards hating his own existence when he cried out in the theater “Don’t do it. Nothing good will come of it, only remorse, hatred, scandal, and two children whose characters are monstrous.” I think this dream is really a reflection of himself, and how he finds that it all could’ve been prevented if it weren’t for his parents getting together. His few moments of weakness in the “theater” seemed to be him realizing how he really despises himself, and it could possibly be the fact that he is so different from him parents. The generation gap led him to feel estranged from them, and sort of lost. I can almost even imagine him sitting down at dinner with his father having forced awkward conversation about what the protagonist wants to talk about, and his father brushing off anything he has to say as nonsense- simply because he cannot relate to his son. I also enjoyed the part where the son said he could relate to the photographer trying to take a beautiful photograph instead of just a picture. When the father got anger, and the son felt remorse, it was a really strong moment in the story showing their differences.
While I agree with some parts of your analysis, Natalie, I’d have to disagree with your analyzation of the narrator’s ending questions - I don’t think he changes his mind at all. The first reason is that, to me, the questions seem rhetorical, “Don’t they know what they’re doing?” Of course they don’t. However, because his parents’ mistakes are so obvious to himself, he’s highly frustrated with their foolishness - especially considering the severe consequences that follow. In class, Spencer mentioned that in Jewish-American literature the mother-figure often speaks in rhetorical question - possibly the narrator is referencing that?
The second reason I disagree is because of the narrator’s stance while asking these questions. The narrator says he’s standing and shouting at the screen. While watching football, have you ever seen someone stand up and yell questions at the TV like “Where are you throwing the ball, man?” or “Which team are you playing for?!” - the viewer is not actually confused about the location of the ball or the player’s team-affiliation, but pointing out through rhetorical question how blatantly wrong the player’s actions are. I think the situation is no different for our narrator - he’s just expressing his frustration. As we discussed in class, this is the climax of the story and his emotional response peaks due to the lasting consequences he’s resultantly endured from his parents’ lack of wisdom.
I choose to write about Delmore Schwartz's "In Dreams Begin Responsibilities." This story really intrigued me because I didn't understand some of it, so it really made me reread it and try to put things together to better understand the story. The point of view of the son that the story was told in really got me to feel for him. I felt his emotions and I could picture what he was saying and hear his voice in the story. I loved the detail and the emotions throughout the story, it made it more interesting and fun to read. For the most part of the story there were a variety of things that I picked up on very easily. I could see the difference between the father and son, the son tends to disagree with his fathers values. I could also tell how opposite the mother and father were. Since it was an arranged marriage you can guess that there might not have been the connection that not arranged marriage would have. The wife seemed to be very naive, frail, and just wants refinement.
I enjoyed the way they described how the father felt towards the mother. In the beginning when the father walks to the house to think and have time to himself and he gets there a little bit early it describes how embarrassed he is. That really touched me because you can feel how nervous he was to be there. Like he didn't know whether to greet her or not or when he sat there with his hat in his hand.
I had no exact questions when regarding this story, it flowed nicely and after we discussed it in class and I went back and reread it I was able to fit in anything I was confused about.
“The Shawl” by Allison Ward is a story about a Mother and a Daughter who find themselves walking to the concentration camps in a large group of people. The story tells about the mother, Rosa, who has a daughter, Magda, and the mother thinks that the Shawl will keep the baby from being taken by the Nazis. Stella, who is another main character in the story, is a young girl who is 14 years old, and taken by the Nazis as well.
In the story, you can start to see that Rosa starts to dislike the young Stella, because Stella wants the Shawl, and that she was jealous of Magda. In the story, Stella and Magda kind of acted as enemies toward each other. The Shawl caused a lot of problems between the two children and even with the Mother, which shows how people can let simple things like a Shawl change their ideas on the idea of saving a human life. The Shawl symbolizes many things. First off, to me, it shows that people can turn hostile over a little thing like a Shawl if they believe in what it represents. To Rosa, it was the only thing that was keeping her child safe. To Magda, the Shawl represented a shield, or safe place for protection, and to Stella, it represents jealousy and want.
Stella eventually takes the Shawl from Magda, and Magda then continues to run in to an electrical fence. The Shawl helped out Rosa when her daughter was killed, because Rosa held it in her mouth so that she wouldn’t scream. She didn’t want to die, so she put it in her mouth to stay silent.
The article makes Stella out to be the villain of the story, which is interesting to me. She seems like the invader on the family that didn’t have much to hope for to begin with. Stella just seemed like another problem that Rosa and Magda had to deal with.
Lastly, Rosa shows exactly what motherly instincts are in this story. She takes care of her daughter at all costs, and she even goes as far as giving her all of her food just so Magda can survive. Rosa does not even feel any type of hunger, even though she is giving away all of her food for her daughter’s survival. This shows what motherhood does to a mother. Even though she was at the toughest time in her life and couldn’t even eat, she still put her daughter first all the way until her daughter was killed.
When you said that Stella’s hostility towards Magda causes problems between the two daughters, I have to disagree. I think the real tension lies between Stella and Rosa. “…She looked at Stella’s bones without pity…” Rosa does not seem to care as much for Stella as she does for Magda. I feel like she resents Stella for trying to stay alive, and views her as selfish. She even goes as far as to accuse Stella of cannibalism; “She was sure that Stella was waiting for Magda to die so she could put her teeth into the little thighs.” Stella, as a fourteen year old girl, hasn’t reached full maturity yet. Given her situation and her age, she probably cannot help acting like a child, especially when her mother goes to great lengths to protect her other daughter and looks at Stella with hatred and fear. Stella longs for the same attention and warmth that her mother gives to Magda, and doesn’t have a problem taking it away from her. In my opinion, Rosa seems to use Magda as a life preserver. She views Magda as a symbol of hope, and gives everything she has to keep her alive. She does not seem to even care that she is wasting away, stating that she doesn’t even feel hunger, but feels like someone in a trance. She has removed herself and her needs as a human being from the situation in order to keep Magda alive. Like you said, Rosa’s motherly instincts took over even at the toughest time in her life, and she gave up everything she had in order to keep Magda alive. However, as soon as her child was gone, her own survival instincts kick in and she uses the shawl to silence her own screams. Like the shawl was for Magda up until her death, the shawl is now a source of comfort for Rosa as she mourns the loss of her daughter.
Justin Huntman I agree with your interpretation of reading I feel like there is so much more to say about the Shawl. Where you begin to describe what the Shawl symbolizes is great but I feel like there is so much more to say. I would say in the beginning of the story the Shawl represents not only the protection you describe but Hope. It is seen as hope for the young childes future. She says how the shawl can feed the child for 3 days and it is the hope that that shawl can keep the child alive. Its message of protection that you touch on is very important. It is the difference of life or death for this child. It is what is key to keeping this kid alive and well and hope that is can survive long enough for the mother to give the child away. They symbolism is very strong in this story I just feel that wasn’t touched on enough in this paper. Where I would see it as the focus on the story I guess you would see it as a minor role to the characterization, plot, and setting that is presented in the reading called The Shawl.
In response to your post and your insights on the character of Stella, I have a few insights to add myself. Stella’s character, at least in my interpretation, gave off the vibe that she was Rosa’s other daughter. While reading this story, I was under the impression that Stella was simply Magda’s older sister, hence her jealously for her when Magda is getting all of the attention from Rosa. I also found it interesting that the story almost writes Stella out to be this sort of “villain” character. It seems to me as though there is more to Stella than just cruelty and selfishness. I think it is important to remember that Stella herself is still a young woman, and although that does not excuse any of her behavior towards Rosa and Magda, is going through just as rough a time as the rest of them are. I felt that the story could have elaborated on Stella’s character a little more; she definitely could have used a little bit more depth to her character.
Furthermore, I think you make an excellent point in saying that the Shawl represents many things in this story. The Shawl almost acts as a fourth character in this scenario and represents something that all three characters want and need. In some ways, I think the Shawl represents hope for all three characters. To all three characters, the Shawl represents the hope of freedom and shelter, along with the hope of someday being able to feel safe and warm again.
I decided to talk about “In Dreams Begin Responsability” by Delmore Schwartz. I was fascinated how the narrator combined a dream from reality. At the beginning it was confusing to know if he was talking about and actual movie, or if he was dreaming. As the story continued you could see some moments of clarity where the narrator could see every detail happening while in other moments it was much of a blur to him and their were many thing that he missed out. That was the moment when I realize this was not a movie or real life, that everything he was telling was about a dream he was having. The narrator tried to confused us and this made the story disorienting.
In the narrators dream we can see how he is struggling with what is going on at home, we could should predict that now their parents after many years of marriage were having problems and were fighting a lot. When stand up and he starts yelling at the movie he said, “ ...Nothing good will come from it, only remorse, hatred, scandal, and two children whose characters are monstrous.” Here we see he is having a internal issue with himself referring to his character as “monstrous”. I believe this could be a sign of depression of the narrator and now he could not handle anymore all the conflicts going on at home.
When he talks about his parents, he describes two completely different persons and for him they never had something in common. The issue here was that they were marrying each other for prestige and not for real love and this made the narrator angry, he seems like a romantic. He is not proud of the ways his dad acted around his mom and how was their relationship build, he gets frustrated in some scenes and starts crying. In this dream he can see how they are actually not meant for each other, and believed that they made a big mistake marrying each other.
We can see from the narrators reactions to what his dad said and did, that he was not like his dad and that he would never want to be similar to his father. He looked as his dad as an omnipotent man, who is more interested in the money and the prestige he made through the years than his own happiness and love. For his dad happiness came with money and money gave you a position in life and being important in the society was the only thing that matter to him. We can see that the narrator does not like at all this way of thinking and he owes to himself to be different from his dad, to find real love and marry someone forever, to be happy and most important everything in life is not money and prestige.
The reading that stuck out the most to me was “In Dreams Begin Responsibilities” by DELMORE SCHWARTZ. I found the construction of the story to be unique and interesting. However, the story within a story set up was a little too heavy handed for my taste. A kid watching his parent’s relationship beginning in a movie theater operates as an extended metaphor stretched too thin. The use of third person omniscient was also a little peculiar. I think it took something away from the story. A lot of potential tension between the child and his parents because of miscommunications, misunderstandings, generation gaps, is lost because they are transparent to him and to the reader. If the story is about one child’s struggle growing up with parents in an unhealthy relationship, a major part of that struggle is not getting where your parents came from. In fact, a major part of the struggle between all parents and children is a lack of context. In this story, the child knows the parents better than they know themselves. Also, I’m not even sure if he was in a real movie theater imagining his parent’s relationship over a movie that is actually playing or if it’s all just in his mind. This story reminded me of the short story by Anzia Yezierska. Both speak from the perspectives of children about issues and conflicts a child would be unable to comprehend. Both stories’ narrators used language unfit for the age they claim to be in their stories. In this case, instead of struggling against discrimination, the narrator criticizes his family. The narrator presents a very different view of how children see their parents. This child goes back to his parent’s first date, not their first fight. He sees his parents wholly, not just as his mom and dad. The narrator understands that his parents have an identity separate from being his parents. This is something I only realized a few years ago. I wonder if this is a “Jewish thing”? To see that his parent’s conflict and struggle began way before the hardships of life is very wise. Both characters are human; not all bad, not all good. The narrator does not paint his parents as, “the bad guys” who raised such awful children. He sees them as people who are not good together. That distinction is not only impossible for someone the age of the narrator, it is also very difficult in America. Parents are not often celebrated for their wisdom and experience in the USA. The focus of American culture is often on youth, staying young, staying hip. Rather than seeing his parents as squares, he adopts a much more complete picture, highlights and imperfections.
In Cynthia Ozick’s “The Shawl” we find a mother and her two daughters suffering an agonizing life under Nazi rule in a concentration camp. The mother, Rosa, focuses on the survival of her children, especially her 15 month old, Rosa. The constant use of imagery allows for readers to clearly picture the events as they occur. Repetition and vivid description emphasize the cruelty faced by these innocent prisoners. The word “ravenous” is repeated multiple times throughout the piece in order to describe Stella. The author describes Stella as a jealous, selfish, even cannibalistic sister, who seems to yearn the passing of her little sister. I sensed a lack of connection between Rosa and Stella due to the way Rosa depicted her own daughter. I question the relationship of the trio and feel that there is much stronger relationship between Rosa and Magda. The description of Magda is placed in the piece for a reason. Her looks differ from Stella and I believe there is a deeper meaning behind that. For Stella to compare Magda to an Aryan exemplifies the lack of relation felt by Stella towards her own “sister.” I agree with Stephanie’s point that Stella is declared as the villain from the start of the work. Rosa starves in order to feed her daughters, but Stella does not seem thankful for anything and is depicted as a cannibal, pressing the death of Magda. The author repeatedly speaks about the death of Magda. On several occasions she says that Magda is dead even though she is still alive in the shawl. She knew that her life would soon be cut short once she starts moving and escapes the shelter of her shawl. As a baby it was easy for her to stay hidden, but once she grew, Rosa knew that death was near. I expected for Stella’s actions to lead to the death of Magda. She was a villain from the start and it seemed as if her jealousy was growing to the point where she wished death upon her infant sister. The shawl represented life for Magda and Stella knew that without the shawl her death would follow immediately. I also wish there was more backstory on Stella because he jealousy and near hatred toward her sister is unanswered. I understand that Rosa focuses on Magda the majority of the time but that still does not give Stella reason for her action. In all, I truly connected to this story and gained a deeper understanding of the livelihoods of those in concentration camps. I enjoyed the use of repetition and deep description in order to allow the audience to visualize the events taking place. This is a very “cold” story that leaves nothing filtered out. The shawl represented everything desired by one suffering in the concentration camp, food, clothing, and shelter. A mother’s love is depicted to the fullest; Rosa sacrifices herself to protect Magda and Stella. At the end, when Magda’s dead body lies on the floor, Rosa does not move nor murmur because she still has a job to do, protect and care Stella.
After reading The Shawl by Cynthia Ozick, I had mixed emotions about everything that was happening in the story. It’s sad to see that many were suffering especially an innocent such as Magda who had to be hidden just to be kept alive. But the selflessness her mother Rose showed was amazing. Although she was withering away, she did all she can from hiding her to giving Magda all she had to keep her baby alive, even after she did not believe that Magda will not live for long. Rose still did her best to make her baby see another day. This leads me to think about the shawl that helped Rose keep Magda alive for over a year. The shawl itself plays an important role in this story. The shawl is like a source of life you can say. Without it, Magda could have been died at the beginning of the story. When Magda was separated from the shawl – the source of life, in a way it can be said that caused her to die. And when Rose watched her baby land on the floor after being electrocuted because the shawl was in her hand she was able to silent her cry. The shawl kept them silence which persevere their lives. I also have mix reaction towards Stella but I’m more negative towards her. Yes she was young too but I don’t believe that the way she reacted towards Magda was just childish – and wasn’t kids in that era more mature around age 14? So I don’t see why she would take the shawl away from Magda after seeing that it is the shawl that kept Magda silent and safe. Overall it’s amazing how one shawl can be seen as a “source of life”, keeping two alive during hard times. But this story was okay, sad but good.
I completely agree with your evaluation of the shawl acting as a source of life because without it Magda wouldn’t have survived as long as she did and without Magda, I do not think Rosa would have had the motivation to keep pressing on. To add on to the symbolization of the shawl in the story, I think it also acted as a barrier between the chaotic surroundings and the warmth of a familiar person for Magda. There was a clear difference in the tone of the story during times when the shawl was being described and times when the outside world was being described.
When it comes to Stella, I too felt negatively towards her due to her selfishness and lack of compassion. Here you have Rosa; an older lady who is sacrificing most of herself in order to keep a young child alive that she knows won’t even survive in the long run. And yet, on the other side, you have Stella, who is clearly jealous and only cares about her own survival enough that she would steal the only thing keeping a younger child alive. The character of Stella only further heightens my admiration towards all that Rosa is doing to keep Magda alive.
Cristina Diaz Indeed I agree with Vanessa's interpretation that the actual shawl represented a source of life in this story. We read about Rosa a mother in a concentration camp with two daughters, Stella who is fourteen and Magda who is still a toddler. It is evident throughout the story that Rosa takes more of a stand in Magda's life; doing everything in her power to keep the child alive. Unfortunately, Stella is described more shrewdly in her primitive manners, only preoccupied by her own survival and not that of her family. An example of this is when the narrator states, "Rosa gave almost all her food to Magda, Stella gave nothing; Stella was ravenous, a growing child herself, but not growing much". I truly enjoyed the contrast throughout the story and Stella is a prime example of contradictions throughout the narrative. She gave no food up for her family, yet she was still not growing; her jealousy and selfishness, not getting her anywhere. Rosa on the other hand, exhibited traces of compassion and selflessness. For instance, she gave up her own food to keep her toddler alive and she dreamed of giving her away in order for her to live, "Rosa floating, dreaming of giving Magda away in one of the villages". Through vivid imagery the reader is able to relive what this family of three had to endure. It is a crude, cold story; it gives the reader a real picture of what took place behind the horrifying electrical fences of the concentration camps. It does this not by simply telling the reader, but by sharing a story and allowing the reader to see it for themselves.
“In Dreams Begin Responsibilities” by Delmore Schwartz really hit home with me a lot more than "The Shawl". This is because it amazing me with how impactful it was while being on the shorter side. When I first read this story I thought it was going to conclude with an happy ending. My mind had this thought because of it had a theme of young love going on at the start. These thoughts quickly escaped my mind however, because the narrator in the story was always eluded towards to dreadful ending that many marriages face. This brings me to my next thought on the story. I thought the movie within a story was a very interesting element, and made it much more enjoyable to read. I also thought it was done in a way that was not over confusing. This is important because I feel as though this angel could make a very poorly constructed story by other authors. The story used this element to create a great frame element, beginning and ending with the narrators thoughts.
What I really noticed in my second read of the story, however, was the great contrast between the narrator mother and fathers actions from early in the story compared to the end. In the beginning you have a man who is nervous just to be at the house of the women he is trying to court. And he tries what I think is to hard to assert his dominance and power to this female. He wants to show that he's the opposite and a simple and average man but rather lives an educated and well-off lifestyle. This isn't the case later on in the story when he couldn't care less about what his now wife thinks about his power and lifestyle. This is demonstrated most during the picture scene, when the photographer is trying to time his time so that he achieves "art", but the narrators dad has no time for that anymore.
Overall I found this to be a very enjoyable read. I found this strange because the themes in the story should have made me feel another way. The reason why I think I enjoyed this story so much was its unique angle with the movie within the story. It moved flawlessly from the narrators thoughts back to the movie. The ending was also very memorable, and it left me thinking what could have been if she had chased after him. But then again, that probably wouldn't have changed anything.
Ginny Renas The story that I’d like to discuss is Delmore Schwartz’s, “In Dreams Begin Responsibilies”. Although I enjoyed our reading from Anzia Yezierkska, this story was personally more inviting because, unlike “How I Found America”, it left open many doors for interpretation. Focusing solely on the first page, I think the form of this story really captures the dream state of confusion, elements of distant memory that are followed by exact details, and subconscious thoughts coming to life. When the story begins it is very clear to the reader that the narrator is dreaming. He “thinks” it is a certain year and “feels” as if he was at the movies. The story then reads, “The shots themselves are full of dots and rays, as if it were raining when the picture was photographed. The light was bad.” This gives a beautiful visual as to how many dreams feel as they begin. The dots and rays portray a shady and unclear beginning to the narrators dream. The bad lighting continues to paint a picture of a distant dream that has little significance to his actual life. Directly after this dull vision, the writing becomes definite and precise. The narrator knows the exact date and to the exact detail of what his father is wearing on this particular day. I love this transition from confusion to precision because I personally feel it captures how many dreams progress. This first part about his father depicts the part of a dream one remembers when they wake up. Consider how you would typically explain your dream to someone else. Very seldom is one able to explain any dream they have had from the moment they started dreaming until the second they wake up. It is much more common to experience some clear and defined moments in a dream with parts around it that are vague and blurred. With all of this being said, the extra element that I believe Schwartz has added to make the writing confusing and at times somewhat “un-dreamlike” is the narrator’s subconscious. While many of our dreams may be directly related to our subconscious, this form of writing sometimes comes way outside the box of how any normal person would experience a dream. For example, throughout the dream you discover that the narrator has a horrifying picture of his parents’ “love”. The foreshadowing of how their marriage will turn out is explained on the day his parents get engaged, a day our narrator certainly was not a part of, nor even alive for that matter. However, all of these details of the day his parents got engaged are crucial to gain our sympathy for the narrator.
Personally, at the end, my wish for the narrator was to eventually have a love that was the complete opposite of the one his parents had. I’m not sure I would have felt this way if the text did not take the extra step, out of the dream, to find deeper meaning and definition to the characters in the story.
Maggie McCloskey I really liked the story "In Dreams Begin Responsibility" by Schwartz. One of the things I liked was that each reader can experience and interpret the story differnetly, which really engages and makes the story personal. To me the story was a bit heartbreaking because as a reader we see this kid who wholeheartedly regrets his parents marriage, which in turns he wishes he was never born. At one point he even says that he and his sibling have these monster characteristics.
The story then jumps to his twenty first birthday, which shows that he is around my own age. It is at this point that I am able to relate to the narrator. At some point or another we all have to try to figure out why we are here. What is our purpose? I think that is what the character is doing, trying to figure out who he is and what he is suppose to do. It is also clear that he does not want to become his father or make the same mistakes as he did. He is still pretty young and is trying to make sense of everything.
This story also calls upon the reader to think about what is actually important. On one side is the narrator's father who appears to take pleasure and love money and wordly posessions above all else. Then there is the narrator who goes deeper and sees the value in things like the arts.
Kendall Torres In Schwartz’s piece In Dream Begin Responsibility, the narrator expresses many facets of depression and self hate. As he sits in the movie theatre watching his parents courtship, the narrator again and again shows his sense of unease with their relationship. Although the theatre scene is only him dreaming, his dread is his reality. While the narrator plants the seeds of doubt about the on-camera couple into the minds of the reader, I then saw signs that the marriage wouldn’t last, although nothing of the degree described by the narrator. When the narrator becomes overwhelmed and yells at the screen, telling his parents that nothing good will come of their marriage, this includes himself. He means that even he was not good enough to be worth the misery that their union caused. He describes his own character as monstrous. This tells me, as the reader, that the narrator must be suffering from depression and self-loathing, to feel so low about himself as to rue the day his parents decided to get married and wish that they had not. The narrator also exemplifies one of the main struggles of every Jewish family, from one generation to the next. The narrator struggles to define himself as something different from his father. The narrator’s father would have either been an immigrant himself, or the first generation born in America. He would still have seen many of the hardships, although he had a good job and a better income, and therefore was very concerned with status, knowing how hard it would have been to achieve it. Making it to the middle class would have been a huge success for the father, something which he would have wanted his children, especially any sons, to continue on. The narrator, on the other hand, is an artist. He sees the world in a different way from his father, who is very much a realist. This would not have sat well with a man who had worked hard to rise above the poverty most immigrants faced and would have wanted his son to carry on the family’s social status. The narrator, having grown up with wealth and status, is not fixated on them but rather on understanding the world around him , as well as in enjoying the beauty of nature. The narrator cries at the sight of the waves, while his parents barely see them. Schwartz presents a short piece that leaves much up to interpretation, allowing readers to try and understand the perspectives of the narrator while also delve into his reasoning and background.
I very much enjoyed reading Schwartz’s piece, “In Dreams Begin Responsibility”. It is interesting to read this response to the piece because I very much agree with her point of view on the narrator’s sense of self-loathing and hate. Hearing someone say that his or her parents should not get married because of the monstrous effects that will come in the future is just plain strange in my opinion. It takes an extreme amount of self-hate to almost say you wish you were never born, and mean it. The second part of the response, in my opinion, is beautifully stated. Her comparisons to the differences in the father and sons views on life could not have been more on point. I, too, agree that making it to the middle class would have been a great accomplishment for the father, but the son does not care about the status quo. As Kendall stated, the narrator is a artist and sees the world in a different perspective, causing his dreams to be different that the fathers. In my opinion, this causes great tension between the father and son, and much of the unease in the narrator’s life. I think Schwartz’s short story is a great coming of age piece and a distraction between what is reality and dream.
Danielle Kaufman- The Shawl I found “The Shawl” to be incredibly moving and shocking. It seems to reach into the mind of holocaust victims and pull out their darkest thoughts. At first when I read it, there was some confusion. I didn’t know the relationship between Magda, Stella, and Rosa. However I think a lot of my confusion was that I simply just wanted to read more of the story. Besides some questions I had with the story I really enjoyed reading it. Cynthia Ozick does a magnificent job at portraying the thoughts and feelings Rosa has as she sees her baby being killed. However I questioned a lot of Rosa’s thoughts. I wondered if some of the things she was thinking wasn’t actually reality and she was just extremely paranoid. For instance I questioned whether Stella really had the desire to eat Magda or if this was just a twisted worry in Rosa’s head. Even though the story clearly highlights the indescribable bond that Magda and Rosa had, I was more interested in the relationship between Rosa and Stella. Rosa portrayed Stella as some sort of monstrous cannibal. Rosa repeats a couple of times that Stella is jealous of Magda. Rosa is fixated on the idea that Stella wants to eat Magda. I found it really insightful when the narrator says “then Stella took the shawl away and made Magda die”. Rosa blames Magda’s death completely on Stella for taking the shawl. She doesn’t see the reality of the situation. I felt really sad for Stella because of all the hatred Rosa had towards her. It seemed that Rosa almost neglected Stella. Even though Stella was 14 years old, she still needed her mother just like Magda did. What I loved most about this story was the symbolism of the shawl. I interpreted the shawl as the physical form of the mother-daughter relationship between Rosa and Magda. It was the unbreakable bond and immense love that made Rosa not give up on Magda. She gave everything she had and more to Magda to keep her alive. The selflessness that is depicted in a time of tragedy and horror is astounding. Rosa risked it all to keep Magda alive and when she finally died to almost seemed like a relief. The part that effected me most was when Magda was killed. Rosa couldn’t scream or else she would have been killed too. Instead she takes the shawl and shoves it in her mouth to block out the shrieks. It was the symbolism of the shawl and the realism of the situation throughout the story that made it such a good read.
After reading Delmore Schwartz's short story "In Dreams Begin Responsibilities" and learning some background information about him I could clearly see his and the narrator's struggle with being second generation Jewish Americans. Throughout the story there are places of conflict between the narrator's and the father's ideals of what a happy and fulfilling life should consist of. On one hand first generation Jewish immigrants were more focused on overcoming struggles of being in a new country and becoming successful Americans. However I feel that second generation Jews such as the narrator in the story were less concerned with money and success and more concerned with finding happiness and the beauty of nature. In the story Schwartz provides two examples that really illustrate this point, one being where the narrator's parents are staring at the ocean indifferently and the other when the father hurries a photographer to take a picture. In the ocean scene the parents just see a body of water that is nothing special, but the narrator sees something beautiful yet powerful and it moves him. I also think the rough ocean waters are somewhat of a prelude to the parents failing marriage. In the other scene the narrator describes his parents taking a picture together and the photographer wants to get it just right, however the father would rather just get it over with. This infuriates the narrator who takes the side of the photographer who has an artistic soul just like the narrator. This story provides a look into the divide in cultural norms between two generations. Another element that is quite noticeable is how anxious the narrator is to grow up, after all the horrific dream he is having is on the eve of his twenty first birthday. I believe most of this anxiety stems from not wanting to make the same mistakes his father makes. He does not want to have a failed marriage and children who turn into monsters; as he describes himself and his sibling. As with most kids at the age of 21 I can relate to this struggle of growing up, as graduation creeps closer and closer the anxiety of getting into graduate school and preparing to enter into the real world increases exponentially.
There is something hauntingly beautiful about Cynthia Ozick’s, The Shawl. Although only four pages in length, I connected more with this story more than anything we have yet to read in class. The depth and human emotion Ozick is able to wield is more powerful than any superfluous words or layered character analysis, in my opinion. The story of a woman and her child experiencing the atrocities of a concentration camp, although fiction, gives deep insight into the struggles of motherhood within these confines. When one is literally starving, is it worth it to give all your food to your children in hopes that they may live? Or would one be better served keeping themselves alive so that they may attempt to make sure their children stay alive? In The Shawl, Rosa takes the approach of almost starving herself to make sure that Magda will have something to eat. This is extremely enlightening, because on many occasions, Rosa already concedes that “[she] knew Magda was going to die very soon” (2). Why then, if Rosa knew death was imminent for this child, would she almost kill herself in attempts to preserve her life as long as possible? I think the answer is, she was a mother. Protecting one’s child does not always make perfect sense. Yes she knew Magda would probably die, but if there was even a single chance she might come out of this alive, to her it was worth giving all she had. Truly and admirable character, Rosa is directly contrasted by her friend Stella. I use friend very loosely, because most of the narrators dialogue depicts much animosity between the two. While Rosa would do anything for Magda, Stella is apparently “waiting for Magda to die so she could sink her teeth into those little thighs” (2). This quote sets a sinister background for the story, because based on Stella’s previous descriptions and behavior, she does not seem like someone that would sink to such depraved, inhuman behavior. From here we can deduce that either Rosa has gone slightly crazy from the ride to the concentration camp, or that the conditions they are in make Stella’s behavior an actual possibility. Either way, it helps the reader understand the calamity of their situation, and of course is darkly foreshadowing how Stella participates in the cause of Magda’s death. “Then Stella took the shawl away and made Magda die,” laments Rosa, before she retells how her baby was killed in her camp (3). One of the most beautiful yet unbearable parts of the story, Magda’s death provides a deep understanding of Rosa’s thought process and character. When Stella takes Magda’s shawl, Magda wanders into the middle of the compound and begins to wail. “Rosa saw today that Magda was going to die, and at the same time a fearful joy ran in Rosas’s two palms, her fingers were on fire, she was astonished” (3). Where does this astonishment, this fearful joy come from? Rosa describes that these feelings are due to the fact that her child can speak and make noise; she is not a mute. Since the train ride Magda has not made a single sound, and Rosa was worried there was something wrong with her child. The fact that Rosa clearly knows her child is about to die, but is overjoyed at the fact that her baby can speak, that she has a voice, is absolutely heart wrenching. In an environment where pity no longer exists, where every layer of human emotion is stripped from one’s weak bones, these feeling entitled to a mother stand strong. She still exists.
In Henry Roth's Call It Sleep, several Freudian Ideas are represented, particularly the idea of superego, id, and ego. In Book I, The Cellar, the construction of the words of narration, the author's voice, and the character David represent the superego, the id, and the ego respectively. Roth's use of the stream of consciousness plays on this ideology. The narrator's words represent the superego not in the traditional Freudian sense where the superego stands for moral and upright opinions and a critical reflection of social standards. Rather, the narrator's words reflect the social standards for literary works. The narrator provides the straightforward descriptions throughout the story. The narrator speech pattern is stoic and it does not vary too widely despite the ever changing tone of the piece. For example, when David is interacting with Yussie, the narrator's words remains dependable, "In the street David spoke English." (pg. 21) The narrator's words, in keeping with their superego nature, are not the most illustrious or ground breaking. The words of the narrator are straight forward and consistent. However, in some points in the story, the writing goes from narration into the author's voice in one sentence. For instance, "Holding the little wheel in his hand, David wondered again why it was that every boy on the street knew where his father worked except himself." (pg. 22) In this excerpt, the narrator's words, clearly explain the actions, and provide a gateway to the author's voice, which is filled with emotions and opinions. Perhaps the most complicated aspect of Roth's writing is the use of his own voice. As a modernist writing, Call It Sleep is filled with stream of consciousness recollections. This is portrayed through the author's voice, and represents the Freudian id, or an idea that is divorced from reality and focused on pleasure. Throughout the story, the author's voice provides details in a fluid manner, and it does not always make logical sense. For instance, when the song is being sung the author's voice around the song is nonsensical. It is stated, " Fragments of forgotten rivers floated under the lids, dusty roads, fathomless curve of trees, a branch in a window under flawless light. A world somewhere, somewhere else." (pg. 23) Clearly, the author's voice is lucid and free flowing, with little concern for realism or structure. According to Freud's theory, the ego is the part of the personality which is responsible for the realistic and tangible aspects of life. In the story, David represents this idea, because he is a real and tangible character. However, the key component of Freud's idea of the ego is that the ego acts as a middle ground for the superego and the id. Similarly, David acts as the neutral character between the author's voice and the narrator's words. For example, the introductory paragraph slips between the author's voice and the narrator's words, and these two pieces become solidified when David begins to call "Mama!" (pg. 17) David is the reason the tale holds together. As a character, David offers enough variety and emotion to represent the id, but he is also structured and reasonable to represent the superego. As the audience is taken through David's life with his mother and Yussie, David's speech are moments of realism and clarity through the web of confusing internal consciousness.
Lucy Macias The imagery Cynthia Ozick used to describe the concentration camp experience was intense, with just the right amount of mystery. At times there was the feeling that I was reading a biblical story, one of a great miracle. At least that was the impression I had. The first reference of Stella as a cannibal shed light on the roles each character represented. “She was sure that Stella was waiting for Magda to die so she could put her teeth into the little thighs.” This image took me aback some, because it really put into perspective the blind animalistic nature in which people were behaving due to the extreme suffering they were undergoing. Then when Rosa is afraid of someone other than Stella stealing Magda to feast upon her flesh, it then began to irk within me that Stella was sort of the personification of the people on the verge of annihilation in the concentration camps. Stella was like the results of evil deeds breaking the souls of people, and Magda was a sort of savior, symbol, or some reservoir of purity and goodness. Then there was the magical shawl, and the question as to why Magda was privileged enough to be the owner. This set-up among the characters, in which Magda was a benevolent being, and Stella almost the counter opposite, with Rosa in between as Magda’s protector in the midst of a persecution and the presence of a mysterious magical shawl is what makes it feel like the story of a miracle. The whole time I’m waiting for a moment when Magda begins to glow and everyone is free once again; so that doesn’t happen, and so then I was brought back to the cruelty, reality and hopelessness in their experience, despite the magical shawl’s amazing powers. “Magda was defective, without a voice; perhaps she was deaf; there might be something amiss her intelligence; Magda was dumb.” Up until this point something within me was rooting for Magda, and even believed she would live, but the story I feel was only meant to have a biblical allusion and in reality capture the darkness, despair, and coldness of the concentration camp experience, and the impact upon the people who lived it and those who survived. All the buildup of hope accumulated by the existence of Magda despite her grueling odds of survival are then crushed by the fence, which symbolizes the past victims who died with hopes of being free. At that moment I was truly wired by Ozick to feel just a tiny deep sliver of the desolation, and misery experienced by the Jewish people within the camps. Even hope and faith in God faded for many of them as their brothers and sisters and daughters and everyone dissolved into the reigning evil. But this also elevated the meaning of being freed, and the giant new hope this represented for the Jewish people, and again this duality is in part because of the allusion to a Biblical story which naturally would inspire faith.
Allison Ward - The Shawl
ReplyDeleteThe Shawl is a great insight into the lives of three Jewish characters in the marching their way to the concentration camps. One thing that confused me throughout the story is Stella's relation to Rosa and Magda. Was she Rosa's daughter too? Or was she Rosa's sister? I really cannot tell.
It surprised me that there was not a lot of insight into anybody else's character but Stella's. The reader can pick up that Rosa does not see Stella fondly. In fact, the narrator states, "she was jealous of Magda" and "Stella wanted to be wrapped in a Shaw". These two examples are interesting for two reasons. One, because the point of view is third person omniscient, which means we know the characters feelings. Second, because Stella is made out to be a selfish boney child with no feelings for others while Rosa is made out to be a saint in hopes to save her baby with a magical shawl.
The shawl itself is also something to be discussed. Not only is the shawl a symbol for saving Magda, but also it is a symbol for hope for Rosa. The shawl also shields Magda from the Nazis in two ways. Physically, the shawl hides her, and the shawl serves as her pacifier to keep her quiet. Lastly, the shawl serves as Rosa's pacifier when the fence electrocutes Magda. It saves Rosa herself from being shot because of any noise she would have made in response.
What I love about this reading is the strong connection between mothers in daughter in such an extreme time of struggle. You can tell how connected Rose is because she gives every ounce of her food to Magda and because of that her milk runs dry. What I do dislike about this article is the way the author makes Stella out to be some sort of monster. Stella, only 14, is still quite helpless herself. In the passage it says, "Then Stella took the shawl away and made Magda die". This sentence may be true in a way but not all the blame can be pointed at Stella. What about the fact that Rose never tried to giver her away? Or the fact that she never should have let Stella take the shawl, the only protection Magda had against the Nazis?
In the larger context of things, what I took from the story, is that above all else guard your relationships with your children. You can lose somebody within seconds, which is what the electric fence symbolized for me. Secondly, there's often nothing you can do to make it better. Rose shoved the shawl in her mouth because by speaking out she would have made it worse for herself.
What it says about human nature is that when a woman becomes a mother, all other self-needs are forgotten. For example, she felt no hunger. She was wasting away at the cost of her child that she knew would not live. She was even astonished Magda even learned to walk.
Erika Halburian
DeleteTo respond to your question Allison, what I got out of reading the story was that Stella was Rosa’s other daughter therefore making her Magda’s older sister. Stella seamed to be selfish but since they are in a concentration camp I can see where caring for oneself is a necessity. Yes she took the shawl from Magda but she too was left with hardly anything to keep herself warm.
I found the symbol of the shawl very interesting as well. The shawl itself was almost it’s own character in the story because it played just as much of a role as the characters played. The shawl shielded Magda from the Nazi’s, kept her alive by feeding her the milk, and then might have also been a factor in her death. Magda was looking for the shawl that caused her to be seen by the Nazi solider. At the same time the shawl did act as barrier for Rosa’s shrieks that would have gotten her killed.
I would also like to respond how you alluded to the fact that when a woman becomes a mother her needs are forgotten. I agree completely that, which was the case in the story. She could also was prepared that Magda was going to die. She mentioned that Magda would die several times throughout the story before the actual incident occurred.
DeleteIn response to Allison’s post, to be completely honest, I agree with everything you posted. To start, I think that Stella was definitely jealous of Magda and Rosa’s relationship and more of Magda than of the shawl itself. In fact, I think that the shawl represented the jealousy because Stella longed to have that shawl and it was probably in a sense covering up her longing for the attention Magda received. The shawl played a huge role in the story. I agree with the idea that the narrator made Stella’s character out to be a monster. The way she was written is described as a jealous child but I think her behavior was deeper and had a deeper meaning to it. I also didn’t completely understand what was meant by “Stella making Magda die”. Did Magda physically die? Because in the next line she was alive. I think the fact that Stella stole the shawl made her character look bad, but the entire way that her character was written was in an emotion provoking way. Every time Stella spoke or did anything, I would feel some sort of emotion.
I agree with your comment that the electric fence symbolized losing somebody within seconds because Rosa only cared about protecting her child and did whatever she could to keep her alive just like she did whatever she could to avoid that fence. I agree with the comment that this story dealt a lot with mother daughter relationships. The relationship between Rosa and Magda is a strong one. Rosa does anything she can to show her love to Magda, but it is completely the opposite for Stella. It definitely made me wonder why Stella was so unloved; the narrator did a good job of creating that lingering thought.
All in all, I agree with your analysis and it made me understand the story more from reading it.
Jasmine Cox
DeleteAt first, I was also confused about the relationship between Stella and the other two girls, but as I read more I believe that Stella is most likely Rosa's first born. That also gives more of an explanation for the way Stella is treated and how Rosa talks about her. Even though it's terrible to think about, sometimes, the first born's needs are put behind the younger child's. Especially since Magda is so young and they are living in such horrible conditions anyways, Rosa is probably ridiculously stressed and tired. It's still no excuse to call Stella such names as 'cannibal' and say things about how she probably wants to eat Magda. Even though the majority of the story is rested on Stella being the 'bad guy', at the beginning of the story, Rosa and Stella describe Magda as being "one of THEIR babies." This part confused me quite a lot, especially being in the very beginning of the story. How did Rosa end up with an Aryan baby? I guess that's beside the point, just a thought I had as to why they kind of referred to her in such a distant way, like Magda wasn't a part of their family. I agree with everything you say about the shawl, I just feel that it was a symbol of security, in every sense of the word, for every character.
Briana Cherry-Bronson
DeleteFirst, I would like to thank Allison for writing such a clear and straight to the point response. She wrote some interesting and informational points in her response.
I also was wondering what role Stella played in this short story. She was always around and was the enemy of the story. Ok, yes she took the shawl from Magda, but what was her purpose. She did add conflict but I didn’t understand much of her character. And I do agree with the narrator and Allison that the conflict was because of jealously, but I felt like there was more conflict in Stella and Rosa relationship.
Allison also gave an interesting point on the symbolization of the shawl in this short story. I thought the shawl symbolized comfort and security to Magda. And a scapegoat for Rosa, if anything went wrong with her daughter then blames it on the shawl. What I appreciate from Allison is I was a little confused about Magda death, and she explained it with great detail. I do agree with Allison calling the shawl a pacifier for the daughter and mother.
I also agree with Allison, about the strong mother and daughter connection. The author makes it vey appartent and you can tell the mother tried to do her best to keep her daughter alive. I understand that, this story was during a rough time, but I didn’t like how negative the mother was sometimes during the story. It seemed like she had no hope for her daughter and kept thinking it was “time for Magda to die"
Allison, I agreed with mostly everything you said in your post. When it comes to Stella, it really was never made clear to us whether she was Rosa’s daughter or sister or any sort of relation. For all we know they could’ve been acquaintances from the same village and amongst the mass confusion, a familiar face became a best friend.
DeleteGoing to the shawl, I think everything you mentioned was very true. My interpretation of the shawl was also an escape and a blinder of sorts. Magda, this tiny little infant, was covered by a shawl that kept her warm and secluded from the chaos around her. She was ignorant to her surroundings and ignorance truly is bliss. I think Stella was jealous of the shawl for all the reasons you mentioned and because she had to face all this terror while Magda resided in safety and remained a ghost to the world and the Nazis.
Concerning the relationship between Rosa and Magda, I got the same reaction as you. Rosa was willing to do anything to keep her child alive and have her live on. It’s amazing how she kept her head in such dark and cruel times whereas others, such as Stella, were only concerned for their well being and if they made it through these times. Cynthia Ozick effectively portrayed the unbreakable bond between parent and offspring.
Chynna Humphrey
DeleteIn response to your first question, I took from the story that both Magda and Stella are Rosa’s daughters. Though it was kind of unclear at first, after re-reading the story, I’m sure this is the case. I think that Stella’s jealousy came out of the fact that she was the ignored daughter. Rosa cared so fondly for Magda and kept her so safe and warm; whereas, just because Stella was older, she had to fend for herself and she didn’t get as much attention from her mother. I agree that the shawl was a representation of hope for survival and protection because it was the protective barrier that shielded Magda from the Nazis. However, I also saw the shawl as a symbol of naivety and immaturity. Stella is forced to be mature and fend for herself in walking to the concentration camps because he mother is so focused on protecting Magda. Magda, constantly covered by the shawl, is safe from danger and cannot see the brutal world around her as she’s carried around with, essentially, a blindfold over her eyes. It’s not until Stella takes the shawl from Magda that she sees the world cruelty of the world. Her death occurs because the symbolic shawl is no longer hiding her from the realities of the world they were living in.
Kayleigh Koskan
DeleteIn response to Allison, I agree with most of what you said. I too am confused as to what the relationship between Rosa and Stella is. Stella is jealous of Madge throughout the story but I feel like there is more to the jealousy than just over the shawl. I think Stella might be jealous between the relationship that Madge and Rosa had if you are to assume that Stella is Rosas older daughter. What I’m uncertain about in your reaction is when you say that you loved the strong connection between mother and daughter and that the moral of the story was to guard your relationships with your children, if Stella was also her daughter then why didn’t Rosa ever do anything to protect her? Why was she so disgusted at the older girl? Also, if that was not her daughter and Madge was her only child and she was to protect her then would it not make sense to continue that goal and help her as she is getting electrocuted? If it were my child dying I would have run to be with them. If that’s all you have left during this hard time then why think twice about being murdered when your only means of living is already dead? This story was just weird to me. I don’t really understand Rosas way of thinking but I believe it would have been clearer to me if I had known the relationship between Rosa and Stella.
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ReplyDeleteNatalie Palmer - In Dreams Begin Responsibilities
ReplyDeleteI find Delmore Schwartz’s narrator to be a very astute and perceptive person, yet he is full of regrets and has too strong a focus on the past instead of his own future. His character comes across as broken and hurting, seeming to despise his own existence. Through the observations he makes of his parents, we actually learn a lot more about the narrator than we do his mother and father, of which he spends a great time describing. His opinions shed more light on his own person than those of his parents.
He begins his inner conflict when he has this almost out of body feeling where he is in a theater, watching his parent’s first meeting unfold before his eyes. His observations are laden with his opinions and discrepancies with his father. When he describes his father walking across the street, he pointedly describes his tie. “His clothes are newly pressed and his tie is too tight in his high collar.” He takes the time to show his father’s attempt at looking rich and refined. He furthers this point by pointing out, “He jingles the coins in his pockets, thinking of the witty things he will say.” I can almost hear the narrator mocking his father, using the word “witty” to mean “pretentious.”
But moving away from that is how he reacts to their actions. He gets angry, he cries, all showing what his past must have been like. How difficult was his childhood that he wished that he had never been born? That his parents had never been married? “…it was then that I stood up in the theatre and shouted: "Don't do it. It's not too late to change your minds, both of you. Nothing good will come of it, only remorse, hatred, scandal, and two children whose characters are monstrous." These emotions, remorse, hatred, and scandal all tell of what happened to his parents. Wishing they had never been married, the mounting hatred as the years pass, and the possible scandal of adultery. The last sentence of the quote is the load-bearing sentence of the entire story, meaning that it is such a strong and unexpected dialogue and without it, the story would not be as complete. To consider that he and his sibling are monsters implies so much about his character. Is he selfish, angry, possibly immoral?
The narrator’s thought process drastically takes a turn where, at the end, he seems to take back the load-bearing sentence when his parents are in the psychic’s booth. After the narrator’s father finds the entire situation “intolerable,” his father gets up and leaves his mother in the booth on her own. The narrator yells at the screen saying, "What are they doing? Don't they know what they are doing? Why doesn't my mother go after my father? If she does not do that, what will she do? Doesn't my father know what he is doing?" So isn’t this saying that he does want them to get together? Is he trying to hope that the future could be changed, even though the past has already happened?
This makes the narrator such a deep and complex character, showing his multi-faceted personality. His mental tug-of-war is a part of his past, just as much as it may be in his future.
I agree whole-heartedly with your analysis of In Dreams Begin Responsibilities, Natalie. I noticed that you picked up on some of the confusion I felt as well when the narrator started shouting questions at the screen that made it seem like he didn’t want his parents to separate. Throughout the entire story, the narrator constantly belittles his father; revealing his arrogance, his greedy desires and lack of compassion—showing the audience his views on his father—but then says something like, “Why doesn’t my mother go after my father?” when he leaves her with the fortune-teller? It’s a bit puzzling because it seems as though the narrator changes his point right as the story is ending.
DeleteBut then, I thought, what if that’s what he meant to do? Not necessarily change the point, but show that the narrator may not truly want his life to be undone after all. As you mentioned, this story is about the narrator’s inner conflict. He begins by subtly making his want to be “anonymous” known and then reiterates the same thought a little farther into the story, calling himself “monstrous” but then, right before he awakes, he has this revelation that makes him question himself. When the usher hauls the narrator out of the theatre, he asks, “What are you doing?” This makes it clear to the reader that even though the story made it seem like it was about how his father wasn’t good for his mother and they should’ve never gotten together, what the narrator is actually doing is projecting his feelings of wishing he wasn’t born on to his parents’ relationship.
Hailey Dolan
Kyndall Herman
DeleteI also very much agree with what Natalee has to say. I did not pick up on what was really going on until we discussed the story in class, and I did feel as though the protagonist was focusing on his past and not so much into his future. He did in fact imply towards hating his own existence when he cried out in the theater “Don’t do it. Nothing good will come of it, only remorse, hatred, scandal, and two children whose characters are monstrous.” I think this dream is really a reflection of himself, and how he finds that it all could’ve been prevented if it weren’t for his parents getting together. His few moments of weakness in the “theater” seemed to be him realizing how he really despises himself, and it could possibly be the fact that he is so different from him parents. The generation gap led him to feel estranged from them, and sort of lost. I can almost even imagine him sitting down at dinner with his father having forced awkward conversation about what the protagonist wants to talk about, and his father brushing off anything he has to say as nonsense- simply because he cannot relate to his son.
I also enjoyed the part where the son said he could relate to the photographer trying to take a beautiful photograph instead of just a picture. When the father got anger, and the son felt remorse, it was a really strong moment in the story showing their differences.
While I agree with some parts of your analysis, Natalie, I’d have to disagree with your analyzation of the narrator’s ending questions - I don’t think he changes his mind at all. The first reason is that, to me, the questions seem rhetorical, “Don’t they know what they’re doing?” Of course they don’t. However, because his parents’ mistakes are so obvious to himself, he’s highly frustrated with their foolishness - especially considering the severe consequences that follow. In class, Spencer mentioned that in Jewish-American literature the mother-figure often speaks in rhetorical question - possibly the narrator is referencing that?
DeleteThe second reason I disagree is because of the narrator’s stance while asking these questions. The narrator says he’s standing and shouting at the screen. While watching football, have you ever seen someone stand up and yell questions at the TV like “Where are you throwing the ball, man?” or “Which team are you playing for?!” - the viewer is not actually confused about the location of the ball or the player’s team-affiliation, but pointing out through rhetorical question how blatantly wrong the player’s actions are. I think the situation is no different for our narrator - he’s just expressing his frustration. As we discussed in class, this is the climax of the story and his emotional response peaks due to the lasting consequences he’s resultantly endured from his parents’ lack of wisdom.
Desiree Amadeo
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ReplyDeleteStephanie Smith
ReplyDeleteI choose to write about Delmore Schwartz's "In Dreams Begin Responsibilities." This story really intrigued me because I didn't understand some of it, so it really made me reread it and try to put things together to better understand the story. The point of view of the son that the story was told in really got me to feel for him. I felt his emotions and I could picture what he was saying and hear his voice in the story. I loved the detail and the emotions throughout the story, it made it more interesting and fun to read. For the most part of the story there were a variety of things that I picked up on very easily. I could see the difference between the father and son, the son tends to disagree with his fathers values. I could also tell how opposite the mother and father were. Since it was an arranged marriage you can guess that there might not have been the connection that not arranged marriage would have. The wife seemed to be very naive, frail, and just wants refinement.
I enjoyed the way they described how the father felt towards the mother. In the beginning when the father walks to the house to think and have time to himself and he gets there a little bit early it describes how embarrassed he is. That really touched me because you can feel how nervous he was to be there. Like he didn't know whether to greet her or not or when he sat there with his hat in his hand.
I had no exact questions when regarding this story, it flowed nicely and after we discussed it in class and I went back and reread it I was able to fit in anything I was confused about.
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DeleteThis comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDelete“The Shawl” by Allison Ward is a story about a Mother and a Daughter who find themselves walking to the concentration camps in a large group of people. The story tells about the mother, Rosa, who has a daughter, Magda, and the mother thinks that the Shawl will keep the baby from being taken by the Nazis. Stella, who is another main character in the story, is a young girl who is 14 years old, and taken by the Nazis as well.
ReplyDeleteIn the story, you can start to see that Rosa starts to dislike the young Stella, because Stella wants the Shawl, and that she was jealous of Magda. In the story, Stella and Magda kind of acted as enemies toward each other. The Shawl caused a lot of problems between the two children and even with the Mother, which shows how people can let simple things like a Shawl change their ideas on the idea of saving a human life.
The Shawl symbolizes many things. First off, to me, it shows that people can turn hostile over a little thing like a Shawl if they believe in what it represents. To Rosa, it was the only thing that was keeping her child safe. To Magda, the Shawl represented a shield, or safe place for protection, and to Stella, it represents jealousy and want.
Stella eventually takes the Shawl from Magda, and Magda then continues to run in to an electrical fence. The Shawl helped out Rosa when her daughter was killed, because Rosa held it in her mouth so that she wouldn’t scream. She didn’t want to die, so she put it in her mouth to stay silent.
The article makes Stella out to be the villain of the story, which is interesting to me. She seems like the invader on the family that didn’t have much to hope for to begin with. Stella just seemed like another problem that Rosa and Magda had to deal with.
Lastly, Rosa shows exactly what motherly instincts are in this story. She takes care of her daughter at all costs, and she even goes as far as giving her all of her food just so Magda can survive. Rosa does not even feel any type of hunger, even though she is giving away all of her food for her daughter’s survival. This shows what motherhood does to a mother. Even though she was at the toughest time in her life and couldn’t even eat, she still put her daughter first all the way until her daughter was killed.
Christen Caporali
DeleteWhen you said that Stella’s hostility towards Magda causes problems between the two daughters, I have to disagree. I think the real tension lies between Stella and Rosa. “…She looked at Stella’s bones without pity…” Rosa does not seem to care as much for Stella as she does for Magda. I feel like she resents Stella for trying to stay alive, and views her as selfish. She even goes as far as to accuse Stella of cannibalism; “She was sure that Stella was waiting for Magda to die so she could put her teeth into the little thighs.” Stella, as a fourteen year old girl, hasn’t reached full maturity yet. Given her situation and her age, she probably cannot help acting like a child, especially when her mother goes to great lengths to protect her other daughter and looks at Stella with hatred and fear. Stella longs for the same attention and warmth that her mother gives to Magda, and doesn’t have a problem taking it away from her.
In my opinion, Rosa seems to use Magda as a life preserver. She views Magda as a symbol of hope, and gives everything she has to keep her alive. She does not seem to even care that she is wasting away, stating that she doesn’t even feel hunger, but feels like someone in a trance. She has removed herself and her needs as a human being from the situation in order to keep Magda alive. Like you said, Rosa’s motherly instincts took over even at the toughest time in her life, and she gave up everything she had in order to keep Magda alive. However, as soon as her child was gone, her own survival instincts kick in and she uses the shawl to silence her own screams. Like the shawl was for Magda up until her death, the shawl is now a source of comfort for Rosa as she mourns the loss of her daughter.
Justin Huntman
DeleteI agree with your interpretation of reading I feel like there is so much more to say about the Shawl. Where you begin to describe what the Shawl symbolizes is great but I feel like there is so much more to say. I would say in the beginning of the story the Shawl represents not only the protection you describe but Hope. It is seen as hope for the young childes future. She says how the shawl can feed the child for 3 days and it is the hope that that shawl can keep the child alive. Its message of protection that you touch on is very important. It is the difference of life or death for this child. It is what is key to keeping this kid alive and well and hope that is can survive long enough for the mother to give the child away. They symbolism is very strong in this story I just feel that wasn’t touched on enough in this paper. Where I would see it as the focus on the story I guess you would see it as a minor role to the characterization, plot, and setting that is presented in the reading called The Shawl.
Stephanie Jones
ReplyDeleteIn response to your post and your insights on the character of Stella, I have a few insights to add myself. Stella’s character, at least in my interpretation, gave off the vibe that she was Rosa’s other daughter. While reading this story, I was under the impression that Stella was simply Magda’s older sister, hence her jealously for her when Magda is getting all of the attention from Rosa. I also found it interesting that the story almost writes Stella out to be this sort of “villain” character. It seems to me as though there is more to Stella than just cruelty and selfishness. I think it is important to remember that Stella herself is still a young woman, and although that does not excuse any of her behavior towards Rosa and Magda, is going through just as rough a time as the rest of them are. I felt that the story could have elaborated on Stella’s character a little more; she definitely could have used a little bit more depth to her character.
Furthermore, I think you make an excellent point in saying that the Shawl represents many things in this story. The Shawl almost acts as a fourth character in this scenario and represents something that all three characters want and need. In some ways, I think the Shawl represents hope for all three characters. To all three characters, the Shawl represents the hope of freedom and shelter, along with the hope of someday being able to feel safe and warm again.
Cristina Vallarino
ReplyDeleteI decided to talk about “In Dreams Begin Responsability” by Delmore Schwartz. I was fascinated how the narrator combined a dream from reality. At the beginning it was confusing to know if he was talking about and actual movie, or if he was dreaming. As the story continued you could see some moments of clarity where the narrator could see every detail happening while in other moments it was much of a blur to him and their were many thing that he missed out. That was the moment when I realize this was not a movie or real life, that everything he was telling was about a dream he was having. The narrator tried to confused us and this made the story disorienting.
In the narrators dream we can see how he is struggling with what is going on at home, we could should predict that now their parents after many years of marriage were having problems and were fighting a lot. When stand up and he starts yelling at the movie he said, “ ...Nothing good will come from it, only remorse, hatred, scandal, and two children whose characters are monstrous.” Here we see he is having a internal issue with himself referring to his character as “monstrous”. I believe this could be a sign of depression of the narrator and now he could not handle anymore all the conflicts going on at home.
When he talks about his parents, he describes two completely different persons and for him they never had something in common. The issue here was that they were marrying each other for prestige and not for real love and this made the narrator angry, he seems like a romantic. He is not proud of the ways his dad acted around his mom and how was their relationship build, he gets frustrated in some scenes and starts crying. In this dream he can see how they are actually not meant for each other, and believed that they made a big mistake marrying each other.
We can see from the narrators reactions to what his dad said and did, that he was not like his dad and that he would never want to be similar to his father. He looked as his dad as an omnipotent man, who is more interested in the money and the prestige he made through the years than his own happiness and love. For his dad happiness came with money and money gave you a position in life and being important in the society was the only thing that matter to him. We can see that the narrator does not like at all this way of thinking and he owes to himself to be different from his dad, to find real love and marry someone forever, to be happy and most important everything in life is not money and prestige.
Devin Harkins
DeleteI also thought the story was quite confusing the first time I read “In Dreams Begin Responsibility”. Although I don’t think that the author’s purpose of writing his story in that sequence was to confuse his audience. I don’t think that an author ever wants to confuse his/her audience because that usually means people won’t connect with the piece and therefore will stop reading. I believe that he wrote the story in that style because that was the most interesting way to be able to be an objective third party where he could still speak his mind. It was a very clever way to portray his parent’s engagement. The parts that confused me the most were the moments or memories that were skipped over or muted. In my mind the best answer for those occasions is because he was too focused and aware of himself at those instances and how uneasy watching his parents made him feel. I also agree that the narrator is depressed because he calls himself a monstrous character. It is very common that opposites attract and that they balance each other, but in this example of the narrator’s parents, that cliché statement couldn’t be more wrong. Obviously the parents go married more for social status than love. It is clear that they are not compatible for each other, right down to the smallest things like his father riding an opposite colored horse from his mother. It is very clear from the narrator’s uneasiness to the parents caring more about social status than love, that there is a very large generation gap.
Isabel Willetts
ReplyDeleteThe reading that stuck out the most to me was “In Dreams Begin Responsibilities” by DELMORE SCHWARTZ. I found the construction of the story to be unique and interesting. However, the story within a story set up was a little too heavy handed for my taste. A kid watching his parent’s relationship beginning in a movie theater operates as an extended metaphor stretched too thin. The use of third person omniscient was also a little peculiar. I think it took something away from the story. A lot of potential tension between the child and his parents because of miscommunications, misunderstandings, generation gaps, is lost because they are transparent to him and to the reader. If the story is about one child’s struggle growing up with parents in an unhealthy relationship, a major part of that struggle is not getting where your parents came from. In fact, a major part of the struggle between all parents and children is a lack of context. In this story, the child knows the parents better than they know themselves. Also, I’m not even sure if he was in a real movie theater imagining his parent’s relationship over a movie that is actually playing or if it’s all just in his mind.
This story reminded me of the short story by Anzia Yezierska. Both speak from the perspectives of children about issues and conflicts a child would be unable to comprehend. Both stories’ narrators used language unfit for the age they claim to be in their stories. In this case, instead of struggling against discrimination, the narrator criticizes his family.
The narrator presents a very different view of how children see their parents. This child goes back to his parent’s first date, not their first fight. He sees his parents wholly, not just as his mom and dad. The narrator understands that his parents have an identity separate from being his parents. This is something I only realized a few years ago. I wonder if this is a “Jewish thing”? To see that his parent’s conflict and struggle began way before the hardships of life is very wise. Both characters are human; not all bad, not all good. The narrator does not paint his parents as, “the bad guys” who raised such awful children. He sees them as people who are not good together. That distinction is not only impossible for someone the age of the narrator, it is also very difficult in America. Parents are not often celebrated for their wisdom and experience in the USA. The focus of American culture is often on youth, staying young, staying hip. Rather than seeing his parents as squares, he adopts a much more complete picture, highlights and imperfections.
Vishal Samuel
ReplyDeleteIn Cynthia Ozick’s “The Shawl” we find a mother and her two daughters suffering an agonizing life under Nazi rule in a concentration camp. The mother, Rosa, focuses on the survival of her children, especially her 15 month old, Rosa. The constant use of imagery allows for readers to clearly picture the events as they occur. Repetition and vivid description emphasize the cruelty faced by these innocent prisoners. The word “ravenous” is repeated multiple times throughout the piece in order to describe Stella. The author describes Stella as a jealous, selfish, even cannibalistic sister, who seems to yearn the passing of her little sister. I sensed a lack of connection between Rosa and Stella due to the way Rosa depicted her own daughter. I question the relationship of the trio and feel that there is much stronger relationship between Rosa and Magda. The description of Magda is placed in the piece for a reason. Her looks differ from Stella and I believe there is a deeper meaning behind that. For Stella to compare Magda to an Aryan exemplifies the lack of relation felt by Stella towards her own “sister.”
I agree with Stephanie’s point that Stella is declared as the villain from the start of the work. Rosa starves in order to feed her daughters, but Stella does not seem thankful for anything and is depicted as a cannibal, pressing the death of Magda. The author repeatedly speaks about the death of Magda. On several occasions she says that Magda is dead even though she is still alive in the shawl. She knew that her life would soon be cut short once she starts moving and escapes the shelter of her shawl. As a baby it was easy for her to stay hidden, but once she grew, Rosa knew that death was near. I expected for Stella’s actions to lead to the death of Magda. She was a villain from the start and it seemed as if her jealousy was growing to the point where she wished death upon her infant sister. The shawl represented life for Magda and Stella knew that without the shawl her death would follow immediately. I also wish there was more backstory on Stella because he jealousy and near hatred toward her sister is unanswered. I understand that Rosa focuses on Magda the majority of the time but that still does not give Stella reason for her action.
In all, I truly connected to this story and gained a deeper understanding of the livelihoods of those in concentration camps. I enjoyed the use of repetition and deep description in order to allow the audience to visualize the events taking place. This is a very “cold” story that leaves nothing filtered out. The shawl represented everything desired by one suffering in the concentration camp, food, clothing, and shelter. A mother’s love is depicted to the fullest; Rosa sacrifices herself to protect Magda and Stella. At the end, when Magda’s dead body lies on the floor, Rosa does not move nor murmur because she still has a job to do, protect and care Stella.
Vanessa Previl
ReplyDeleteAfter reading The Shawl by Cynthia Ozick, I had mixed emotions about everything that was happening in the story. It’s sad to see that many were suffering especially an innocent such as Magda who had to be hidden just to be kept alive. But the selflessness her mother Rose showed was amazing. Although she was withering away, she did all she can from hiding her to giving Magda all she had to keep her baby alive, even after she did not believe that Magda will not live for long. Rose still did her best to make her baby see another day.
This leads me to think about the shawl that helped Rose keep Magda alive for over a year. The shawl itself plays an important role in this story. The shawl is like a source of life you can say. Without it, Magda could have been died at the beginning of the story. When Magda was separated from the shawl – the source of life, in a way it can be said that caused her to die. And when Rose watched her baby land on the floor after being electrocuted because the shawl was in her hand she was able to silent her cry. The shawl kept them silence which persevere their lives.
I also have mix reaction towards Stella but I’m more negative towards her. Yes she was young too but I don’t believe that the way she reacted towards Magda was just childish – and wasn’t kids in that era more mature around age 14? So I don’t see why she would take the shawl away from Magda after seeing that it is the shawl that kept Magda silent and safe.
Overall it’s amazing how one shawl can be seen as a “source of life”, keeping two alive during hard times. But this story was okay, sad but good.
I completely agree with your evaluation of the shawl acting as a source of life because without it Magda wouldn’t have survived as long as she did and without Magda, I do not think Rosa would have had the motivation to keep pressing on. To add on to the symbolization of the shawl in the story, I think it also acted as a barrier between the chaotic surroundings and the warmth of a familiar person for Magda. There was a clear difference in the tone of the story during times when the shawl was being described and times when the outside world was being described.
DeleteWhen it comes to Stella, I too felt negatively towards her due to her selfishness and lack of compassion. Here you have Rosa; an older lady who is sacrificing most of herself in order to keep a young child alive that she knows won’t even survive in the long run. And yet, on the other side, you have Stella, who is clearly jealous and only cares about her own survival enough that she would steal the only thing keeping a younger child alive. The character of Stella only further heightens my admiration towards all that Rosa is doing to keep Magda alive.
Cristina Diaz
DeleteIndeed I agree with Vanessa's interpretation that the actual shawl represented a source of life in this story. We read about Rosa a mother in a concentration camp with two daughters, Stella who is fourteen and Magda who is still a toddler. It is evident throughout the story that Rosa takes more of a stand in Magda's life; doing everything in her power to keep the child alive. Unfortunately, Stella is described more shrewdly in her primitive manners, only preoccupied by her own survival and not that of her family. An example of this is when the narrator states, "Rosa gave almost all her food to Magda, Stella gave nothing; Stella was ravenous, a growing child herself, but not growing much". I truly enjoyed the contrast throughout the story and Stella is a prime example of contradictions throughout the narrative. She gave no food up for her family, yet she was still not growing; her jealousy and selfishness, not getting her anywhere. Rosa on the other hand, exhibited traces of compassion and selflessness. For instance, she gave up her own food to keep her toddler alive and she dreamed of giving her away in order for her to live, "Rosa floating, dreaming of giving Magda away in one of the villages". Through vivid imagery the reader is able to relive what this family of three had to endure. It is a crude, cold story; it gives the reader a real picture of what took place behind the horrifying electrical fences of the concentration camps. It does this not by simply telling the reader, but by sharing a story and allowing the reader to see it for themselves.
- Britton Manahan
ReplyDelete“In Dreams Begin Responsibilities” by Delmore Schwartz really hit home with me a lot more than "The Shawl". This is because it amazing me with how impactful it was while being on the shorter side. When I first read this story I thought it was going to conclude with an happy ending. My mind had this thought because of it had a theme of young love going on at the start. These thoughts quickly escaped my mind however, because the narrator in the story was always eluded towards to dreadful ending that many marriages face. This brings me to my next thought on the story. I thought the movie within a story was a very interesting element, and made it much more enjoyable to read. I also thought it was done in a way that was not over confusing. This is important because I feel as though this angel could make a very poorly constructed story by other authors. The story used this element to create a great frame element, beginning and ending with the narrators thoughts.
What I really noticed in my second read of the story, however, was the great contrast between the narrator mother and fathers actions from early in the story compared to the end. In the beginning you have a man who is nervous just to be at the house of the women he is trying to court. And he tries what I think is to hard to assert his dominance and power to this female. He wants to show that he's the opposite and a simple and average man but rather lives an educated and well-off lifestyle. This isn't the case later on in the story when he couldn't care less about what his now wife thinks about his power and lifestyle. This is demonstrated most during the picture scene, when the photographer is trying to time his time so that he achieves "art", but the narrators dad has no time for that anymore.
Overall I found this to be a very enjoyable read. I found this strange because the themes in the story should have made me feel another way. The reason why I think I enjoyed this story so much was its unique angle with the movie within the story. It moved flawlessly from the narrators thoughts back to the movie. The ending was also very memorable, and it left me thinking what could have been if she had chased after him. But then again, that probably wouldn't have changed anything.
Ginny Renas
ReplyDeleteThe story that I’d like to discuss is Delmore Schwartz’s, “In Dreams Begin Responsibilies”. Although I enjoyed our reading from Anzia Yezierkska, this story was personally more inviting because, unlike “How I Found America”, it left open many doors for interpretation. Focusing solely on the first page, I think the form of this story really captures the dream state of confusion, elements of distant memory that are followed by exact details, and subconscious thoughts coming to life. When the story begins it is very clear to the reader that the narrator is dreaming. He “thinks” it is a certain year and “feels” as if he was at the movies. The story then reads, “The shots themselves are full of dots and rays, as if it were raining when the picture was photographed. The light was bad.” This gives a beautiful visual as to how many dreams feel as they begin. The dots and rays portray a shady and unclear beginning to the narrators dream. The bad lighting continues to paint a picture of a distant dream that has little significance to his actual life. Directly after this dull vision, the writing becomes definite and precise. The narrator knows the exact date and to the exact detail of what his father is wearing on this particular day. I love this transition from confusion to precision because I personally feel it captures how many dreams progress. This first part about his father depicts the part of a dream one remembers when they wake up. Consider how you would typically explain your dream to someone else. Very seldom is one able to explain any dream they have had from the moment they started dreaming until the second they wake up. It is much more common to experience some clear and defined moments in a dream with parts around it that are vague and blurred. With all of this being said, the extra element that I believe Schwartz has added to make the writing confusing and at times somewhat “un-dreamlike” is the narrator’s subconscious. While many of our dreams may be directly related to our subconscious, this form of writing sometimes comes way outside the box of how any normal person would experience a dream. For example, throughout the dream you discover that the narrator has a horrifying picture of his parents’ “love”. The foreshadowing of how their marriage will turn out is explained on the day his parents get engaged, a day our narrator certainly was not a part of, nor even alive for that matter. However, all of these details of the day his parents got engaged are crucial to gain our sympathy for the narrator.
Personally, at the end, my wish for the narrator was to eventually have a love that was the complete opposite of the one his parents had. I’m not sure I would have felt this way if the text did not take the extra step, out of the dream, to find deeper meaning and definition to the characters in the story.
Maggie McCloskey
ReplyDeleteI really liked the story "In Dreams Begin Responsibility" by Schwartz. One of the things I liked was that each reader can experience and interpret the story differnetly, which really engages and makes the story personal. To me the story was a bit heartbreaking because as a reader we see this kid who wholeheartedly regrets his parents marriage, which in turns he wishes he was never born. At one point he even says that he and his sibling have these monster characteristics.
The story then jumps to his twenty first birthday, which shows that he is around my own age. It is at this point that I am able to relate to the narrator. At some point or another we all have to try to figure out why we are here. What is our purpose? I think that is what the character is doing, trying to figure out who he is and what he is suppose to do. It is also clear that he does not want to become his father or make the same mistakes as he did. He is still pretty young and is trying to make sense of everything.
This story also calls upon the reader to think about what is actually important. On one side is the narrator's father who appears to take pleasure and love money and wordly posessions above all else. Then there is the narrator who goes deeper and sees the value in things like the arts.
Kendall Torres
ReplyDeleteIn Schwartz’s piece In Dream Begin Responsibility, the narrator expresses many facets of depression and self hate. As he sits in the movie theatre watching his parents courtship, the narrator again and again shows his sense of unease with their relationship. Although the theatre scene is only him dreaming, his dread is his reality. While the narrator plants the seeds of doubt about the on-camera couple into the minds of the reader, I then saw signs that the marriage wouldn’t last, although nothing of the degree described by the narrator. When the narrator becomes overwhelmed and yells at the screen, telling his parents that nothing good will come of their marriage, this includes himself. He means that even he was not good enough to be worth the misery that their union caused. He describes his own character as monstrous. This tells me, as the reader, that the narrator must be suffering from depression and self-loathing, to feel so low about himself as to rue the day his parents decided to get married and wish that they had not.
The narrator also exemplifies one of the main struggles of every Jewish family, from one generation to the next. The narrator struggles to define himself as something different from his father. The narrator’s father would have either been an immigrant himself, or the first generation born in America. He would still have seen many of the hardships, although he had a good job and a better income, and therefore was very concerned with status, knowing how hard it would have been to achieve it. Making it to the middle class would have been a huge success for the father, something which he would have wanted his children, especially any sons, to continue on. The narrator, on the other hand, is an artist. He sees the world in a different way from his father, who is very much a realist. This would not have sat well with a man who had worked hard to rise above the poverty most immigrants faced and would have wanted his son to carry on the family’s social status. The narrator, having grown up with wealth and status, is not fixated on them but rather on understanding the world around him , as well as in enjoying the beauty of nature. The narrator cries at the sight of the waves, while his parents barely see them.
Schwartz presents a short piece that leaves much up to interpretation, allowing readers to try and understand the perspectives of the narrator while also delve into his reasoning and background.
Ashley Hicks
DeleteI very much enjoyed reading Schwartz’s piece, “In Dreams Begin Responsibility”. It is interesting to read this response to the piece because I very much agree with her point of view on the narrator’s sense of self-loathing and hate. Hearing someone say that his or her parents should not get married because of the monstrous effects that will come in the future is just plain strange in my opinion. It takes an extreme amount of self-hate to almost say you wish you were never born, and mean it.
The second part of the response, in my opinion, is beautifully stated. Her comparisons to the differences in the father and sons views on life could not have been more on point. I, too, agree that making it to the middle class would have been a great accomplishment for the father, but the son does not care about the status quo. As Kendall stated, the narrator is a artist and sees the world in a different perspective, causing his dreams to be different that the fathers. In my opinion, this causes great tension between the father and son, and much of the unease in the narrator’s life.
I think Schwartz’s short story is a great coming of age piece and a distraction between what is reality and dream.
Danielle Kaufman- The Shawl
ReplyDeleteI found “The Shawl” to be incredibly moving and shocking. It seems to reach into the mind of holocaust victims and pull out their darkest thoughts. At first when I read it, there was some confusion. I didn’t know the relationship between Magda, Stella, and Rosa. However I think a lot of my confusion was that I simply just wanted to read more of the story.
Besides some questions I had with the story I really enjoyed reading it. Cynthia Ozick does a magnificent job at portraying the thoughts and feelings Rosa has as she sees her baby being killed. However I questioned a lot of Rosa’s thoughts. I wondered if some of the things she was thinking wasn’t actually reality and she was just extremely paranoid. For instance I questioned whether Stella really had the desire to eat Magda or if this was just a twisted worry in Rosa’s head. Even though the story clearly highlights the indescribable bond that Magda and Rosa had, I was more interested in the relationship between Rosa and Stella. Rosa portrayed Stella as some sort of monstrous cannibal. Rosa repeats a couple of times that Stella is jealous of Magda. Rosa is fixated on the idea that Stella wants to eat Magda. I found it really insightful when the narrator says “then Stella took the shawl away and made Magda die”. Rosa blames Magda’s death completely on Stella for taking the shawl. She doesn’t see the reality of the situation. I felt really sad for Stella because of all the hatred Rosa had towards her. It seemed that Rosa almost neglected Stella. Even though Stella was 14 years old, she still needed her mother just like Magda did.
What I loved most about this story was the symbolism of the shawl. I interpreted the shawl as the physical form of the mother-daughter relationship between Rosa and Magda. It was the unbreakable bond and immense love that made Rosa not give up on Magda. She gave everything she had and more to Magda to keep her alive. The selflessness that is depicted in a time of tragedy and horror is astounding. Rosa risked it all to keep Magda alive and when she finally died to almost seemed like a relief. The part that effected me most was when Magda was killed. Rosa couldn’t scream or else she would have been killed too. Instead she takes the shawl and shoves it in her mouth to block out the shrieks. It was the symbolism of the shawl and the realism of the situation throughout the story that made it such a good read.
In Dreams Begin Responsibilities
ReplyDeleteAfter reading Delmore Schwartz's short story "In Dreams Begin Responsibilities" and learning some background information about him I could clearly see his and the narrator's struggle with being second generation Jewish Americans. Throughout the story there are places of conflict between the narrator's and the father's ideals of what a happy and fulfilling life should consist of. On one hand first generation Jewish immigrants were more focused on overcoming struggles of being in a new country and becoming successful Americans. However I feel that second generation Jews such as the narrator in the story were less concerned with money and success and more concerned with finding happiness and the beauty of nature. In the story Schwartz provides two examples that really illustrate this point, one being where the narrator's parents are staring at the ocean indifferently and the other when the father hurries a photographer to take a picture. In the ocean scene the parents just see a body of water that is nothing special, but the narrator sees something beautiful yet powerful and it moves him. I also think the rough ocean waters are somewhat of a prelude to the parents failing marriage. In the other scene the narrator describes his parents taking a picture together and the photographer wants to get it just right, however the father would rather just get it over with. This infuriates the narrator who takes the side of the photographer who has an artistic soul just like the narrator. This story provides a look into the divide in cultural norms between two generations.
Another element that is quite noticeable is how anxious the narrator is to grow up, after all the horrific dream he is having is on the eve of his twenty first birthday. I believe most of this anxiety stems from not wanting to make the same mistakes his father makes. He does not want to have a failed marriage and children who turn into monsters; as he describes himself and his sibling. As with most kids at the age of 21 I can relate to this struggle of growing up, as graduation creeps closer and closer the anxiety of getting into graduate school and preparing to enter into the real world increases exponentially.
There is something hauntingly beautiful about Cynthia Ozick’s, The Shawl. Although only four pages in length, I connected more with this story more than anything we have yet to read in class. The depth and human emotion Ozick is able to wield is more powerful than any superfluous words or layered character analysis, in my opinion. The story of a woman and her child experiencing the atrocities of a concentration camp, although fiction, gives deep insight into the struggles of motherhood within these confines. When one is literally starving, is it worth it to give all your food to your children in hopes that they may live? Or would one be better served keeping themselves alive so that they may attempt to make sure their children stay alive? In The Shawl, Rosa takes the approach of almost starving herself to make sure that Magda will have something to eat. This is extremely enlightening, because on many occasions, Rosa already concedes that “[she] knew Magda was going to die very soon” (2). Why then, if Rosa knew death was imminent for this child, would she almost kill herself in attempts to preserve her life as long as possible? I think the answer is, she was a mother. Protecting one’s child does not always make perfect sense. Yes she knew Magda would probably die, but if there was even a single chance she might come out of this alive, to her it was worth giving all she had.
ReplyDeleteTruly and admirable character, Rosa is directly contrasted by her friend Stella. I use friend very loosely, because most of the narrators dialogue depicts much animosity between the two. While Rosa would do anything for Magda, Stella is apparently “waiting for Magda to die so she could sink her teeth into those little thighs” (2). This quote sets a sinister background for the story, because based on Stella’s previous descriptions and behavior, she does not seem like someone that would sink to such depraved, inhuman behavior. From here we can deduce that either Rosa has gone slightly crazy from the ride to the concentration camp, or that the conditions they are in make Stella’s behavior an actual possibility. Either way, it helps the reader understand the calamity of their situation, and of course is darkly foreshadowing how Stella participates in the cause of Magda’s death. “Then Stella took the shawl away and made Magda die,” laments Rosa, before she retells how her baby was killed in her camp (3).
One of the most beautiful yet unbearable parts of the story, Magda’s death provides a deep understanding of Rosa’s thought process and character. When Stella takes Magda’s shawl, Magda wanders into the middle of the compound and begins to wail. “Rosa saw today that Magda was going to die, and at the same time a fearful joy ran in Rosas’s two palms, her fingers were on fire, she was astonished” (3). Where does this astonishment, this fearful joy come from? Rosa describes that these feelings are due to the fact that her child can speak and make noise; she is not a mute. Since the train ride Magda has not made a single sound, and Rosa was worried there was something wrong with her child. The fact that Rosa clearly knows her child is about to die, but is overjoyed at the fact that her baby can speak, that she has a voice, is absolutely heart wrenching. In an environment where pity no longer exists, where every layer of human emotion is stripped from one’s weak bones, these feeling entitled to a mother stand strong. She still exists.
In Henry Roth's Call It Sleep, several Freudian Ideas are represented, particularly the idea of superego, id, and ego. In Book I, The Cellar, the construction of the words of narration, the author's voice, and the character David represent the superego, the id, and the ego respectively. Roth's use of the stream of consciousness plays on this ideology.
ReplyDeleteThe narrator's words represent the superego not in the traditional Freudian sense where the superego stands for moral and upright opinions and a critical reflection of social standards. Rather, the narrator's words reflect the social standards for literary works. The narrator provides the straightforward descriptions throughout the story. The narrator speech pattern is stoic and it does not vary too widely despite the ever changing tone of the piece. For example, when David is interacting with Yussie, the narrator's words remains dependable, "In the street David spoke English." (pg. 21) The narrator's words, in keeping with their superego nature, are not the most illustrious or ground breaking. The words of the narrator are straight forward and consistent. However, in some points in the story, the writing goes from narration into the author's voice in one sentence. For instance, "Holding the little wheel in his hand, David wondered again why it was that every boy on the street knew where his father worked except himself." (pg. 22) In this excerpt, the narrator's words, clearly explain the actions, and provide a gateway to the author's voice, which is filled with emotions and opinions.
Perhaps the most complicated aspect of Roth's writing is the use of his own voice. As a modernist writing, Call It Sleep is filled with stream of consciousness recollections. This is portrayed through the author's voice, and represents the Freudian id, or an idea that is divorced from reality and focused on pleasure. Throughout the story, the author's voice provides details in a fluid manner, and it does not always make logical sense. For instance, when the song is being sung the author's voice around the song is nonsensical. It is stated, " Fragments of forgotten rivers floated under the lids, dusty roads, fathomless curve of trees, a branch in a window under flawless light. A world somewhere, somewhere else." (pg. 23) Clearly, the author's voice is lucid and free flowing, with little concern for realism or structure.
According to Freud's theory, the ego is the part of the personality which is responsible for the realistic and tangible aspects of life. In the story, David represents this idea, because he is a real and tangible character. However, the key component of Freud's idea of the ego is that the ego acts as a middle ground for the superego and the id. Similarly, David acts as the neutral character between the author's voice and the narrator's words. For example, the introductory paragraph slips between the author's voice and the narrator's words, and these two pieces become solidified when David begins to call "Mama!" (pg. 17) David is the reason the tale holds together. As a character, David offers enough variety and emotion to represent the id, but he is also structured and reasonable to represent the superego. As the audience is taken through David's life with his mother and Yussie, David's speech are moments of realism and clarity through the web of confusing internal consciousness.
Lucy Macias
ReplyDeleteThe imagery Cynthia Ozick used to describe the concentration camp experience was intense, with just the right amount of mystery. At times there was the feeling that I was reading a biblical story, one of a great miracle. At least that was the impression I had. The first reference of Stella as a cannibal shed light on the roles each character represented. “She was sure that Stella was waiting for Magda to die so she could put her teeth into the little thighs.” This image took me aback some, because it really put into perspective the blind animalistic nature in which people were behaving due to the extreme suffering they were undergoing. Then when Rosa is afraid of someone other than Stella stealing Magda to feast upon her flesh, it then began to irk within me that Stella was sort of the personification of the people on the verge of annihilation in the concentration camps. Stella was like the results of evil deeds breaking the souls of people, and Magda was a sort of savior, symbol, or some reservoir of purity and goodness. Then there was the magical shawl, and the question as to why Magda was privileged enough to be the owner. This set-up among the characters, in which Magda was a benevolent being, and Stella almost the counter opposite, with Rosa in between as Magda’s protector in the midst of a persecution and the presence of a mysterious magical shawl is what makes it feel like the story of a miracle. The whole time I’m waiting for a moment when Magda begins to glow and everyone is free once again; so that doesn’t happen, and so then I was brought back to the cruelty, reality and hopelessness in their experience, despite the magical shawl’s amazing powers. “Magda was defective, without a voice; perhaps she was deaf; there might be something amiss her intelligence; Magda was dumb.” Up until this point something within me was rooting for Magda, and even believed she would live, but the story I feel was only meant to have a biblical allusion and in reality capture the darkness, despair, and coldness of the concentration camp experience, and the impact upon the people who lived it and those who survived. All the buildup of hope accumulated by the existence of Magda despite her grueling odds of survival are then crushed by the fence, which symbolizes the past victims who died with hopes of being free. At that moment I was truly wired by Ozick to feel just a tiny deep sliver of the desolation, and misery experienced by the Jewish people within the camps. Even hope and faith in God faded for many of them as their brothers and sisters and daughters and everyone dissolved into the reigning evil. But this also elevated the meaning of being freed, and the giant new hope this represented for the Jewish people, and again this duality is in part because of the allusion to a Biblical story which naturally would inspire faith.