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Foreword
"A few years ago, I was surprised with an invitation to
come to Germany to give a series of readings. I was, I admit,
curious about this nation and its people; who they were now
and how they lived with their legacy. With the conviction that
Jews should not step foot in Germany, some acquaintances of
mine were appalled that I had accepted the invitation. No
matter how much time has passed, they cannot forgive. Part of
me understood that decision, but part of me did not want to
blame subsequent generations for what a previous generation
had done. I thought it was a good idea to experience Germany
for myself.
"Once there, I was struck hard by two things. One was how
aware I became of my own Jewishness, being conscious of it all
the time as if I'd suddenly grown a third arm. Being Jewish
in Germany felt palpable to me. I seemed unable to define
myself in any other way. The other unexpected thing was that I
met people whom I genuinely liked very much, people with whom
I felt great affinity, kinship even. One woman in particular
I had begun to think of as a friend when on my last night in
Germany, over dinner she told me that her father had been a SS
officer. She did not know what specific crimes he'd been
guilty of because he never spoke of any of those years and she
never asked. Did this, her father's complicity with evil, and
her own evasion of it change my feelings toward her? No. But,
yes. I wasn't sure.
"When I got home, I found I couldn't stop thinking about that
question. I realized I wanted to explore the subject of
degrees of guilt, of when we can and can't let go of our
history, of when our former enemies can be friends. Raising
the stakes a notch, I wondered how it would be for a Jewish
woman to fall in love with a German man. Could they live
happily ever after? Or would the history of the two peoples
disallow such an ending? And from those questions arose my
pair of twentieth-century star-crossed lovers: Hester
Rosenfeld and Heinrich Falk."
—Binnie Kirshenbaum, November 2001
Discussion
Questions
1. While contemplating the book she plans to write, Hester
ponders the question of objectivity between author and subject.
Indeed, is she being objective in her writing of Heinrich's
life or is her account less than reliable?
2. What are we supposed to make of Heinrich? He is a man with
many faults, and yet he is lovable. Are we to take this to
mean that all of mankind is flawed, but still worthy of love
and forgiven his transgressions? Does Heinrich, in this way,
represent Germany?
3. Why would a woman prefer being a mistress to being a wife?
What is it about marriage that Hester fears and disdains, and
do we believe her?
4. Hester's parents were good people who did nothing wrong
and loved their daughter. Yet, she was ashamed of them. What
about our society fosters such feelings?
5. Heinrich, despite being a professor of history, never made
serious inquiry as to what role his parents, especially his
mother, played in the Third Reich. How would you reconcile the
love for your mother with the knowledge that she is perhaps
guilty of crimes against humanity?
6. Heinrich's relationship to women is complicated. He
worships them, respects them, fears them, and can rarely
resist trying to seduce them. To what can we attribute such
conflicting responses?
7. When Hester and Heinrich take their road trip through
Germany, Hester buys postcards, which are printed in the novel
for the reader to see. Why are they there? And what of the
notes Hester takes on the Third Reich and the Middle Ages? How do they add up and connect?
8. By the end of the novel, Hester concludes that, although
she doesn't have sufficient evidence, she wants Heinrich's
parents to be guilty of something awful. She says she won't
stop looking until she finds proof. Why does she want that?
Why will their guilt be satisfying to her?
9. Did Hester overreact to Heinrich's anti-Semitic comment?
Was it, as he claimed, that he simply misspoke? Or was it, as
Hester believed, that prejudice is passed on from one
generation to the next and does not vanish simply because new
laws forbid it?
10. Given the seriousness of the subject matter, why did
Kirshenbaum decide to use humor to tell this story?
11. Hester's relationships with women are perhaps just as
peculiar as Heinrich's. She doesn't seem to maintain close
female friends, and describes herself as a loner. What about
her personal history might account for her being such a
private person?
12. What is sex to Hester and Heinrich—intimacy or
escapism?
13. How might Heinrich have told this story? What would he
have noted about Hester in his journal?
15. While Hester is writing a book about Heinrich as the
German Everyman, Kirshenbaum is writing a book about Hester
as a Jewish-American woman. What larger messages is
Kirshenbaum conveying about that experience?
16. How much time, how many generations must pass, before
wounds of the past can heal? Can they ever be completely
forgiven? Or forgotten?
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