A Wall of Light - Edeet Ravel [17]
29 March 1961
I read with interest the article by K. Shabtai on Jews in Canada, including what Pomerantz, Editor of the Toronto Yiddish paper The Forward, had to say. As Pomerantz based his harsh words on the book by Naftali Satie, Between the Motion and the Act (or, according to him, Between the Movement and the Act), which he criticized and did not correctly evaluate in my opinion, I feel it incumbent upon me to right the wrong.
He wronged the author, first and foremost. Naftali Satie is one of the founders of Eldar, which borders on Lebanon. A year ago he finished writing Between the Motion and the Act and approached Vantage Press, which published it, not in paperback but in attractive hardback format. As soon as the book appeared it aroused great interest in Canada’s literary and artistic community.
Pomerantz, and following him Shabtai, were shocked for some reason by the scene of coupling in the Christian cemetery in Montreal. Because Shabtai didn’t read the book, my comments are directed mainly at Pomerantz. Firstly, the girl he refers to as a Christian prostitute is actually the young man’s Jewish girlfriend. Secondly, they do not desecrate the grave of a youth killed in the war, but in fact weep over it. Finally, they do not have sex on the grave, or even near it.
If Pomerantz had read the book more objectively, and with a little less fear of “what the goyim will say,” maybe he would have grasped its symbolic meaning. If an author attempts to expose, reveal and demonstrate, he must do so without arrogance, and if the Communists who left the Zionist movement are depicted as undergoing a spiritual crisis brought on by a lack of direction, then that is the way things are and nothing will come of silence.
—Zeev Tchornitski, Davar
Dori
The trouble comes. It mostly comes for Lulu.
We’re all brushing our teeth at the sinks. Shoshana notices that Lulu isn’t there. She’s already in the bedroom putting on her pyjamas. Shoshana says Lulu did you brush your teeth? Lulu says yes. Shoshana checks Lulu’s toothbrush and it’s dry.
She grabs Lulu’s arm and pulls her back to the room with the sinks and yells at her is this toothbrush wet? is it wet? feel it feel it! is it wet? Shoshana makes us feel the toothbrush. We’re standing next to the wall and she asks us one by one to feel it and tell her if it’s wet. We don’t want to say but we have no choice. Shoshana yells at Lulu you lied to me you lied to me! She slaps Lulu twice on her face. Then she pulls her hair and throws her on the floor and begins to kick her with her sandal. Lulu screams. Shoshana kicks and yells you lied. If anyone on Eldar saw this they’d throw Shoshana out. But no one sees. No one but us.
Skye doesn’t see either. She escaped to the bedroom when the trouble started.
No one says anything after Shoshana leaves. I suck my finger. Only instead of my eye or my ear the soft thing I touch tonight is my jinnie.
I wait and wait for my goodnight kiss. Finally Daddy comes. I’m so happy to see him! I sit up in bed and reach out my arms to him. He hugs me and kisses me and says he’s sorry he missed me when I visited. He says goodnight doda sweet dreams. I tell him Shoshana hit Lulu but he only smiles and doesn’t say anything.
Daddy doesn’t really believe me. He has to believe me because he thinks you have to respect children but I can tell that even though he respects me and wants to believe me he doesn’t believe me.
The truth is that Mummy once hit me too. It was in the house on Davaar Street.
I loved the house on Davaar Street. There was a long long hall with the kitchen at the end and there was a living room with a big window and a television and a record player and a couch. Mummy and Daddy slept in a bedroom that was right next to the bedroom I shared with my brother David. Their bed was between two doors. I don’t know why that bedroom had two doors. They both led to the same place.
At first I could do whatever I wanted in Canada. But then Mummy took me to a building and inside there was a room and inside the room there were a lot