Your Sad Eyes and Unforgettable Mouth (36 page)

One of my teachers used to quote Flannery O’Connor as saying that if you survive your childhood you have enough to write about for the rest of your life. We absorb everything around us, especially when we are young, and we’re shaped by the mythologies that prevail in our families and cultural background. I’m trying to write about my years on the kibbutz these days. The project is expanding to ridiculous proportions. I have to figure out how to rein it in. ■

DISCUSSION QUESTIONS

1. Some books are driven by character, others by dialogue, and some by plot; this one is grounded in all three, but has a number of particularly strong themes as well. What spoke to you the most—the character of Maya, the book’s insights into human experiences, the descriptions of settings and an era—or something else?
   
2. The Holocaust has initiated many artistic responses in the form of books, films, poems, and works of art. How does this one stand out from other works in its philosophy and approach to a complex subject?
   
3. In the Levitsky household, Maya’s mother and grandmother virtually wait on her hand and foot. She explains that their generation would do almost anything for the
   next one, almost as if filling in the hole left by their own suffering: “It was bad enough I didn’t have a father, cousins, uncles, aunts, more grandparents; bad enough that we were poor—at least I would have an easy life,” she says. Do you think Maya’s life is easy?
   
4. As a child, Maya longs to find a community—and throughout the book she does find it: at the unorthodox, hippie-run Camp Bakunin; in her friend Rosie Michaeli’s house; at the school where she learns Hebrew; and at the local pool. Do you remember the first time you found your own community? How much do you think the plot of our lives is shaped as a result of looking to belong?
   
5. Through the parts of Maya’s upbringing that we see, she has an uncomfortable relationship with sex and sexuality, but she also has a relatively open relationship with her body—for instance, she isn’t too shy to strip naked in front of Patrick in order to make the sad boy laugh. What do you make of that?
   
6. The book has an interesting perspective on sanity and on mental illness. There are characters who seem level-headed (Dr. Moore), and others who seem disturbed (Mrs. Levitsky). Later on, we learn that sanity may be more of a mask than it seems. What do you think is the book’s ultimate pronouncement on mental health?
   
7. This is an extraordinary book with an extraordinary ending. How did you feel when you got to the final chapters? Was the story settled in your mind or did you find yourself continuing it in your head?
   
8. In many ways, this book is a tale of survival—mental, physical, and social—in the face of extraordinary events and personal tragedies. What do you think makes some of us “survivors” in the different senses—mentally, sociologically—and others not? Compare Patrick, Rosie, and Maya as youths and adults: do you think Maya has come through more or less all right?
   
9. As the book ends, we see Maya reflecting on some of the most defining relationships in her life. Ultimately, who would you say has been a more important figure for her—Rosie the love object, or Anthony the torn soul?