Bookclub Discussion Prompts

The Bones of the World is a journey into the corners of suffering, set in the Inquisition, the Holocaust, and the near future. It is a journey the protagonist, Rachel, must take to discover hidden threads of her ancestral suffering and to fulfill the role planned for her by the ancient society of the Keepers of Story.

Questions:

1.The novel is, at least in part, about antisemitism. What is antisemitism? Is it antisemitism, for example, to criticize Israel’s treatment of Palestinians in settlements? Or to criticize the Netanyahu government? Consider this recent article in the Times of Israel about the government’s proposal to eviscerate the judicial branch.

2. The ADL (Anti-Defamation League) has released a survey indicating the rise in negative beliefs about Jews, including “the tropes that they are clannish, conspiratorial and holders of power….” Rachel struggles with ‘clannishness’ in particular in this excerpt:

“Walking down the stairs to make a pot of coffee, her mind raced. Couldn’t Jews themselves be indicted for creating an off-putting insularity? Might the Jewish history of practicing exclusion by ‘circling the wagons’ have contributed, and continue to contribute, to a perceived sense of otherness? And don’t Jews—why did she have such a difficult time saying ‘we’—actually perpetuate this—call it what it is—discrimination against others? This refusal of some to assimilate, isn’t this begging for trouble?” (The Bones @ 8)

Do Jews contribute to their own persecution? Is “insularity” an invitation to hatred? What other cultures or religions separate themselves from others? For what reasons might they do so?

3. The history of the golem in Jewish literature is rich. (See The Golem Redux: From Prague to Post-Holocaust Fiction by Elizabeth R. Baer) In the traditional telling, the much-admired rabbi of Prague, Rabbi Loew, creates a golem to protect the Jewish community from the Christians in Prague who would rise up against them now and again. In later versions of the golem story, the golem might be more human, even kind (Helene Wecker’s The Golem and the Jinni) or as in Michael Chabon’s The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay, it might be a superhero  that could redeem suffering.

What role does Jakob’s Golem play, both ‘realistically’ and metaphorically? What does it mean to “redeem suffering?”

4. Suffering is a staple of this world, antisemitism one of its most enduring forms. The Bones of the World is a plea not for the eradication of suffering, which history shows to be unrealistic, but a search for its subtleties and, even its gifts.

What do we learn about suffering’s subtleties and/or gifts in the novel? Consider this excerpt: “In this life of inevitable pain, each loss allows us to make a choice–to hide from the pain, adopting mask on top of mask so that we can no longer recognize ourselves, or stand with dignity and open hearts and go where the pain leads.” p. 163

5. While antisemitism is on the rise in the United States (and worldwide), a rise in the persecution of “the other” does not limit itself to Jews.

What other groups in the U.S. experience persecution today? Where else in the world is persecution of the “other” evident. Does history suggest why such persecution persists? 

6. What solution does The Bones of the World offer (if any) for institutionalized persecution? 

7. “Suffering’s meaning is as vast as the compendium of its stories; the paradox is its greatest power is not in the many, but in the one.” p.14 What could this mean?

Consider this excerpt: “Just a century ago six million Jews were annihilated. It’s easy to think of the Holocaust as something that happened to a people as a whole. Anonymous. The threat of anonymity is that it escapes moral vision. It’s too easy to look away. A single person’s terror and misfortune, on the other hand, captures our moral imagination and holds it fast. That’s what I felt in the presence of the boy on fire. My moral imagination was burning with him.” p. 279

8. The novel struggles with what it means to be the “Chosen People” of God. Consider these questions that David, Rachel’s son, asks of  his mother:

“Jews occupy a role in history. I don’t say ‘occupied,’ but ‘occupy,’ for it continues. There are periods of dormancy, but we know that Jews as irritants, that which must be washed out, is eternal. The only question, the only question, is when. What does it mean to be the Chosen People? You might say we were chosen to be persecuted and to suffer.

     How then do we act in the moments of persecution? Do we fight back, or are we docile in accepting our deaths? There is a third choice: when they come for us again, as they always will, do we cast off our heritage entirely? That is, do we deny who we are?”

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