The Shawl (Masterplots II: Women’s Literature Series)
At a glance:
- Author: Cynthia Ozick
- First Published: 1989
- Type of Work: Novella and short story
- Genres: Psychological fiction, Social realism, Short fiction
- Subjects: Mothers, Parents and children, Prisoners, Murder or homicide, Europe or Europeans, 1940’s, World War II, Guilt, 1980’s, Child abuse, Mental illness, Obsession, Jews or Jewish life, War, Florida, Nazism or Nazis, Germany or German people, Holocaust, Jewish, Poland or Polish people, Concentration camps, Joy or sorrow
- Locales: Germany, Miami, FL
Form and Content
The short story and the novella that constitute The Shawl were published separately in The New Yorker. Taken together, they present a powerful narrative about one woman’s attempt to maintain sanity in the face of the tragedy of the Holocaust. In “The Shawl,” a rhetorically minimalist short story, Rosa and her niece Stella walk, with Rosa’s silent infant Magda wrapped into the shawl around Rosa’s chest, the long cold roads to the death camp. Although Rosa’s breasts are dry, the infant finds nourishment in the shawl itself, sucking it...
[The entire page is 2456 words long]
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