This week I've begun plowing my way through various articles that deal with women, as discussed by both Talmudic and Roman sources of Late Antiquity. Most scholars agree that this era includes the 3rd - 4th centuries, but some define Late Antiquity as continuing until the Byzantium era [early 5th century], while others end it as late as the Muslim conquest in the 7th century.
A very thought-provoking article discussed the mother-daughter relationship of Late Antiquity, or rather the lack of one. Far more sources reference the mother-son relationship, and those that do mention mothers and daughters do so with regard to mothers preparing their daughters for marriage. The article's author speculates that the poor mother-daughter relationship was real, not an artifact of men writing most history, and related to local marriage customs.
In these times, girls married before they were 16, while men married later, typically in their 20's. Thus a bridegroom could easily be twice the age of his bride. In addition, a bride moved to live with her husband's family. So we have a scenario where a daughter spent only her childhood with her mother, while a son not only stayed home longer before he married, but also remained there afterward. And with an average life expectancy of about 35 years, a woman who survived childbirth would end up a widow in her son's house. Naturally she would have a close relationship with him than with a daughter who lived far away.
By the way, a life expectancy of 35 doesn't mean a bell-shaped curve where most people died within a few years of their 35th birthday. According to cemetery studies in Roman Palestine, approximately 40% of the population died in childhood, the majority of those before they were 5. More girls died young than boys, probably reflecting that in times of scarcity, sons were better fed than daughters. Women often died during their childbearing years, with few living past 50. Unless there was a war, men died throughout adulthood, with some surviving into their 60's and 70's.
So we can see why mothers would be less attached to daughters than sons: girls were more likely to die young and if they did survive to their wedding day, their mothers would seldom see them again. I hope my readers won't complain when I make my next novel's heroine, Rav Hisda's daughter, closer to her father, grandfather, nurse or maidservant than to her mother.
Assuming you've read RASHI'S DAUGHTERS: BOOK II – MIRIAM, you know that I tried to express the angst that two yeshiva students suffer when they become attracted to each other. Well, my own hevruta [study partner] shared that there's a well-done video on YouTube that deals with the very same subject.
And it's the real deal, with authentic Talmud study, Rashi and Tosafot references included, and apparently filmed in an actual yeshiva.
Now that I have a new study partner, I've begun learning Talmud again after many months' hiatus. But my studies are different than when I was researching for RASHI'S DAUGHTERS. Then I wanted to find interesting passages that my characters would study in particular scenes, and if Rashi had a pithy comment, so much the better. Now, since the characters in RAV HISDA'S DAUGHTER are Talmudic figures, my study goal is to learn what the Talmud says about them as well as about the way they and their compatriots lived, both in Babylonia and Roman Palestine.
To that end, I've been searching out "biographies" of the sages, and then jotting down the Talmud reference to each of my primary characters: Rav Hisda, his wife, his sons and his daughters; Rami bar Hama, his mother and his brother; Rava, his children, his father, and his colleague Abbaye. I've done the same with mentions of the above people in the various books I've read about life in Jewish Babylonia. My goal is to eventually check each original Talmud reference myself to see if what it discusses is something that could eventually be a scene.
Over the last three weeks, my study partner Henry and I have gone over nearly every mention of Rav Hisda and his family in the Talmud's first tractate, Berachot. I learned that Rav Hisda exclaims, "Ha Elohim" [The God] when he's surprised or annoyed, that Babylonians 'washed' their hands with dirt, pebbles and woodchips if they didn't have water [or before they washed with water], and that they stuffed their pillows with feathers; also that Rav Hisda is so fastidious that he won't pray until he's 4 amot away from where a disgusting odor dissipates [as opposed to his colleagues who will pray just as soon as they can no longer smell it].
Our last session was studying the dream sugia in Ber 55-56, where Rava and his best friend Abbaye consult a dream interpreter. They each describe identical dreams, but Abbaye pays the interpreter and Rava doesn't, so Abbaye gets good interpretations and Rava gets bad ones. Since these interpretations are supposed to be accurate nonetheless, it's important for my story to know that, among other disasters: Rava will divorce 2 wives, that his sons and daughters will be taken captive, that his wife will die and her children will be raised by a step-mother, that his sons and daughters will die, and that his wife will die [can't tell if this refers to the same wife as before or a different one]. The difficulty about these predictions is that nowhere else in the Talmud do we hear that Rava's children dying or being taken captive, and from another sugia we know that Rava and his wife, Rav Hisda's daughter, lived well into old age. But somehow I will endeavor to use as many of these predictions as possible as plot complications in my novel.
Next week, we start studying Tractate Shabbat.
I've often said that the difference between the historian and the historical novelist is that the former must always be right and the latter cannot be wrong. In other words, as long as nobody can prove that what I write is incorrect, I'm free to put it in my novels. But a post on The Guardian's Book Blog shows that accuracy, or lack of it, in historical fiction, isn't quite so simple and that there's an important difference between lying and making mistakes.
Sometimes an author has compelling reasons for "lying" abut the past, such as not wanting to confuse the reader by using correct period language, or choosing to "rewrite" history because the author suspects that the official history is inaccurate [can we really believe what early Church father wrote about the Jews?]. Another reason is to avoid alienating the reader by too much description of what we would now consider the horrible social or sanitary conditions of the past.
One blog commenter, also a historical novelist, made a similar inaccurate change to what I did in BOOK ONE - JOHEVED. He or she writes, "At what age would characters have become sexually active/married/had children etc? In a period in which life expectancy was 45 or less, probably well before the age of 16. Yet I don't want to be perceived as writing a book about pedophiles, so I'm fudging it."
The blog shares some fascinating pieces of misinformation, such as, "My particular favourite historical error appears at the end of Braveheart, where it is suggested that the future Edward III (born in 1312) was the product of a union between the Scottish rebel William Wallace (executed in London in 1305) and Princess Isabella of France, who was nine at the time of Wallace's death. It would be funny - if I had not met so many people who believed it."
The blogger's conclusions: "Some lies go too far and alienate the reader. Some are too obvious. But some lying is necessary, and to get away with it, one [i.e. the historical novelist] has to be both subtle and convincing."
A little while ago a rabbi friend send me an email asking if I'd read a book by David Goodblatt about rabbis in Sasanian Babylonia. Embarrassed, I had to admit that while the author's name looked familiar, I had no idea if I'd read that particular book. Apparently it was time to start a bibliography for RAV HISDA'S DAUGHTER, something that became clear as I started going through my sources and found a few that I'd photocopied twice and some photocopies from books that I already owned. It took me the good part of last week to put together a preliminary bibliography, and to my astonishment, it's already 10 pages long. [those who are curious can email me for a copy]. And yes, I did have Goodblatt's Rabbinic Instruction in Sasanian Babylonia, as well as two journal articles by him.
Saying that I had 3 sources by Goodblatt doesn't mean that I've read all of them. I've been more active obtaining information than actually digesting it, which comes about because each book or article I read has its own bibliography with new data to check out. So I went through my sources, one by one, checking them off as I entered each in the bibliography [how else will I know later that I've recorded a particular article/book?]. It was only then that I realized that I've probably only read about half of them. In fact I still haven't read most of the photocopies in these 3 files: Talmud Women, History Women, and Talmud Marriage.
OK. I need to stop blogging and start reading. Plus now I'm studying Talmud again each week, which means I have to prepare that week's material in advance. But wait - I just checked out the Cambridge History of Iran, Volume 3: Seleucid, Parthian and Sasanian Periods from LMU Library. Almost 1500 pages of articles about exactly my period of interest, and it looks like I'll be photocopying quite a few of them. And then there's the bibliographies of those articles to go through.
Those with good memories may recall that several weeks ago I mentioned a plan D for deciphering the German in Krauss' Talmudische Archäologie. That plan consisted of hiring a research assistant, which I have now done. Fans often ask if I do all my research myself or do I have help. For Rashi's Daughters, I had help in translating various Hebrew texts, but I did all the research myself. Hiring someone else to do research still meant that I'd have to read all the material myself and decide what info would be useful.
With Rav Hisda's Daughter, however, I'm in a different situation. There's so much info in the Talmud about my main characters that I could spend years going through it and still not find the stuff that would allow me to create the most interesting scenes. My editors, my literary agent, and my family members all urged me to hire some help. But I was pessimistic; after all, where would I find someone with all the necessary skills, especially Talmud expertise, that I'd need in a research assistant would be willing to work part-time for a salary I could afford?
Well, I found him at my own synagogue [no names to protect his privacy] – a young prospective member who'd spent a couple of years studying Talmud in a yeshiva in Jerusalem before attending college. Fluent in Hebrew and Aramaic [plus 4 other languages], familiar with Talmud, and back living with his parents because, like many other recent grads, he couldn't find a job in today's economy. I must confess that I'd had plenty of scholarly discussions with him after services before it occurred to me to ask if he'd like to help me with my research.
So now he's my hevruta [study partner] as well as my assistant. It turns out that there's a Hebrew version of Talmudische Archäologie online, and he's going through it and taking notes for me. He hasn't read my other novels [yet], but he understands what kind of information I'm looking for. Hopefully he'll do all the sifting to find the wheat among the chaff. We're starting our Talmud study by going over all the passages that mention Rav Hisda and his family, beginning with Tractate Berachot. I expect that by the time we've finished Tractate Niddah, I should have a very good sense of Rav Hisda, his daughter and their family – lifestyles, personalities, opinions, and relationships. As well as quite a few scenes to populate my next novel.
Today was Tisha b'Av, the "black fast" as opposed to Yom Kippur's "white fast." One of three Jewish "holidays" that come from the Talmud, not the Torah [the other two are Purim and Hanuka], the origins of this mournful observance have roots in a far murkier past than the Talmud. According to Taanit 30b, " Five events befell our fathers on the Seventeenth of Tammuz and five on Tisha B'Av (the Ninth of Av). On the Seventeenth of Tammuz, the Tablets were broken, the Daily Offering ceased, the City (Jerusalem) walls were breached, Apostumos burned the Torah, and an idol was set up in the Temple. On Tisha B'Av, it was decreed that our fathers should not enter the Land, the Temple was destroyed the first and second time, Bethar was captured, and the City [Jerusalem] was plowed up. When Av arrives, gladness is diminished."
But according to Rashi's commentary, there's more to the story of how Tisha b'Av became associated with mourning when God punished those who believed the spies' evil rapport about Eretz Israel. Once it was decreed that the generation who fled Egypt would not live to enter the Land, the Hebrews didn't just die randomly throughout the year of illness or injuries, as people normally do. No. While wandering the desert, those who didn't die from a plague following their complaints, died only once a year - on Tisha b'Av. Midrash says that on that night, everyone dug a grave and slept in it, and in the morning, those that woke up discovered that one-fortieth of their original population had died during the night. So naturally it was huge day of mourning.
This continued for 39 years; each Tisha b'Av evening the Hebrews slept in graves and the next morning they buried those who hadn't survived the night. Finally the 40th year arrived and the morning of Tisha b'Av found everyone still alive. Sure that they'd made a mistake on the date, the Hebrews slept in their graves again; but everyone was still alive the next morning. Finally they got to the full moon of Tu b'Av and realized that indeed everyone who was supposed to die in the desert had done so, and that those alive were the generation who merited to enter the Land. This is why Tu b'Av became one of the happiest days in the Jewish calendar, associated with matchmaking and weddings.
But even older than this account is the Mesopotamian myth where the month Tammuz was established in honor of, and to mourn for, the eponymous god Tammuz, consort of fertility goddess Inanna/Ishtar. Because Tammuz died at the beginning of summer, Babylonians marked the decline in daylight hours and the onset of killing summer heat and drought with a six-day "funeral" for the god. Women in particular wept and grieved for weeks in sympathy with Ishtar, and all other women who had seen their beloved husbands and sons die young.
Jews who lived in ancient Babylonia could hardly ignore the massive period of mourning going on around them, and eventually created their own, non-idolatrous, reasons to grieve with their neighbors.
I'm back from my travels and finally reconnected with all my luggage. Luckily I've only had suitcases get temporarily lost on flights returning home, where I have plenty of clothes in my closet to wear while waiting for the missing items to be delivered to my house. Just in case, when I travel on book tours, I always pack a nice outfit in my carry-on. I haven't needed it yet, but you never know.
We had a good time, with excellent weather, and I managed to get through much of the research materials I'd copied lately. The Olympic Peninsula has some incredibly gorgeous scenery and we hiked through quite a lot of it. Coincidently, we ended up spending some time in the two Washington state cities that have gained sudden prominence as locations in Stephanie Meyer's "Twilight" novels. When we stopped in Forks [between our stays at Lake Quinault and Lake Crescent] to buy groceries, it took me a little while to realize why there was all this vampire-themed stuff for sale. I confess I haven't read any of Meyer's books, but I did enjoy the first movie on Netflix. A few days later, after one of the most beautiful hikes in my life up Hurricane Hill in Olympic National Park, we decided to have dinner in Port Angeles and coincidently ended up at the Italian restaurant where the two main "Twilight" characters had their first date. Of course the movie playing down the street was the latest in the "Twilight" series.
I mention all this "Twilight" stuff to remind you that it's because of authors like Stephanie Meyer [and J.K. Rowling] that kids become avid readers, and let's face it - the millions of copies that their novels sell are what supports the publishing business today [and apparently a good chunk of the movie business as well]. So hats off to Ms. Meyer and Ms. Rowling for getting those teenagers hooked on reading while they're young. Where would all us midlist authors be without superstars like them?
While I'm on a rare vacation with my husband [staying in historic lodges of
Olympia National Park], my daughter is keeping my blog going. One of my yahoo
Historical Fiction groups just posted a link to "The the impotence of
proofreading." It's a video of a stand-up comic's routine that is sure to make
all writers and editors both wince and giggle in recognition. Check out
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OonDPGwAyfQ& and don't worry, it's PG13.
Despite what my last two posts may have suggested, I've done more than merely read for fun over the previous three weeks. A large part of my time was going through the indices of all three volumes of Samuel Krauss' 1912 Talmudische Archäologie, a classic description of every aspect of life as reflected in rabbinic literature. At first I thought that this invaluable source on the daily life plus economic and social conditions in Talmudic times, would be practically impossible for me to access since it was written in German. Paying someone to translate the entire 1000+ pages would be way too expensive, but I did get a friend to translate the detailed "Table of Contents." After deciding which exact subject I was most interested in, I tried scanning a few pages and sending them through the Google Translator. Unfortunately the process was not only quite time consuming, but the results were far from useful.
So I went to plan B. My English "Table of Contents" was sufficiently detailed that I could see that each subject covered only a few pages. Since the Talmud references on my subjects of interest would enable me to find the primary source, I set to work looking up each footnote in the appropriate section and writing down those that mentioned a specific Talmud page. For example, the House Garden was mentioned in Bava Kama 82b, Shabbat 30b, Menachot 33b, and Moed Katan 7a. It took me the better part of a week to create this list, and Heaven knows how long it will take me to check all these Talmud pages. But at least I know where to look.
Meantime, I also tried plan C. I'm a member of the H-Judaic Listserve, where students and scholars post internet queries and answers on Jewish subjects. I used it a few times while researching RASHI'S DAUGHTERS, and decided to see if perhaps anyone had an English translation of Krauss' work or knew someone who'd made one. Lo and behold, while nobody knew of an English translation, I received several replies informing me of other sources that were similar to Krauss, including one that was available online to download. Amazingly, I heard from Catherine Hezser about her new book, The Oxford Handbook of Jewish Daily Life in Roman Palestine, coming out this fall in honor of the 100th anniversary of Talmudische Archäologie. Now I just have to wait until a copy turns up in one of my local research libraries, or someplace they can get through interlibrary loan.
I also have a plan D, but I'll write about that in my next post, which won't be until I come back from vacation in two weeks. Can you believe that this will be the first vacation my husband and I have taken alone in over 5 years that has nothing to do with researching one of my books?
I'm a big fan of HOLES as well as a bridge player, so I figured to enjoy Louis Sachar's new book for teens, THE CARDTURNER [never mind that my teenage years are long past]. But I LOVED THIS BOOK! You can learn about the story from the Amazon reviews. I'm going to rave about the writing, characters, philosophy, and plotting. Sachar puts you in hero Alton's head so perfectly that everything Alton does/says/thinks is fully integrated into a sympathetic personality. The other characters run the gamut of humanity without being stereotypes: spunky kid sister, odious parents, manipulative best friend, cranky elderly uncle, and crazy cousin who turns out to be not so crazy after all.
But THE CARDTURNER is more than your average "how I spent my summer" teen novel. The mystery that Alton's family has tried so hard to conceal is carefully revealed, mental illness and domestic violence rear their ugly heads, the mutual distain between Alton and his elderly uncle slowly becomes respect and admiration, and young love blooms. Add in some ghosts and philosophical discussions for good measure, plus last, but not least, the game of Bridge. If anything can get kids to start playing bridge, this book will do it. Not that this book is merely for kids.
Unfortunately for me, this is one of the crummy things about being a novelist myself. I used to read fantastic novels that left me feeling, well, fantastic. Reading Sachar's latest work certainly does that, but it also makes me sad knowing that I'll never be able to write so well. Sigh. But I am determined to analyze and learn from his excellent techniques, in hopes that I can make RAV HISDA'S DAUGHTER into a better novel than it would be otherwise.
Again over a week without a blog post, but I have lots of excuses. Sick grandson to care for, family visiting for Father's Day, and after Monday at HUC library, a whole bunch of new research articles to read. But I must confess that I was also totally seduced by two recently published detective novels, which, despite their great differences, had some interesting similarities. They are GIRL WITH A DRAGON TATOO by Stieg Larsson , and a recent addition in NO. 1 LADIES DETECTIVE AGENCY series by Alexander McCall Smith.
The two authors' styles couldn't be more disparate. Larsson's writing is gritty, containing disturbing and graphic violence and sex, while McCall Smith's is sweet and charming, with no sex scenes at all, despite his heroine getting married midway in the series. Larsson's story is a gripping page-turner thriller, while McCall Smith's novels wander leisurely to their conclusion, during which we learn much about his character's philosophy of life.
Yet there are similarities, the most obvious being that each novelist has a best-selling series featuring a woman detective. Larsson intended ten stories featuring heroine Lisbeth Salander, but died unexpectedly after the third. McCall Smith has just published his twelfth about Precious Ramotswe, and shows no sign of ending the series. Both authors write about an incorruptible female who solves mysteries in a foreign country. A most striking similarity is that both women, at least to begin with, distrust men after having suffered physically abuse.
Needless to say, I found it difficult to put down either book, and both whetted my appetite for the next in the series.
