READERS GUIDE
The questions, discussion topics, and other material that follow are intended to enhance your group’s conversation about Two She-Bears, the new novel by the internationally acclaimed Israeli author Meir Shalev, which explores the repercussions of guilt and fate on generations of a Palestinian community.Introduction
One of Israel’s most celebrated novelists—the acclaimed author of A Pigeon and a Boy—gives us a story of village love and vengeance in the early days of British Palestine that is still being played out two generations later.“In the year 1930 three farmers committed suicide here . . . but contrary to the chronicles of our committee and the conclusions of the British policeman, the people of the moshava knew that only two of the suicides had actually taken their own lives, whereas the third suicide had been murdered.” This is the contention of Ruta Tavori, a high school teacher and independent thinker in this small farming community who is writing seventy years later about that murder, about two charismatic men she loves and is trying to forgive—her grandfather and her husband—and about her son, whom she mourns and misses.
In a story rich with the grit, humor, and near-magical evocation of Israeli rural life for which Meir Shalev is beloved by readers, Ruta weaves a tale of friendship between men, and of love and betrayal, which carries us from British Palestine to present-day Israel, where forgiveness, atonement, and understanding can finally happen.
Questions and Topics for Discussion
1. What is the role of storytelling in the novel, both oral and written? Who are the major storytellers and what’s distinct about each of their perspectives?
2. What aspects of village life and Jewish customs are passed down through to the present-day setting of the novel? Do they continue to carry the same meaning, symbolically and literally, in the characters’ lives?
3. Gender is a major determiner of characters’ education and general status in the village. How do the women in particular overcome many of the limits that are placed on them by their husbands, fathers, and other men? Does their ability to do so change between generations and over time? Consider the notion that a woman getting married is compared to “sealing a deed of ownership” (p. 197).
4. Compare the different kinds of bonding that men and women engage in, in particular, the “guy hikes,” when Ze’ev washes Eitan, and the network of veterans even after the men’s service is over. Which feels deeper and more authentic to you—the relationships of the men or of the women?
5. What’s the implied danger—and benefit—to women like Ruta writing their own stories? How does this manifest itself in Ruta’s long discussions with Varda and the ostensible value of Varda’s research about the pre-State Yishuv?
6. What is Ruta’s most important story to tell? How does she gradually reveal information about what happened to Neta?
7. To what degree does Jewish religion and mythology suggest individuals’ abilities to control their fate? Do their attempts to do so ever come to fruition?
8. What is the significance of the ritualization of death and grieving in the Jewish culture? How are the major deaths in the book—from the three farmers’ in 1930 to Neta’s to Ze’ev’s—treated differently?
9. Plants and trees carry great symbolic weight for the characters. Which plants are most auspicious, and how does the way a character treats his or her plants reflect his or her personality? Consider the connection between Ze’ev and his carob tree, and his various rules for the plants and people he lets into the nursery.
10. Ruta describes Eitan after “the disaster” as her second husband, whose “change is complete, like an insect’s metamorphosis” (p. 13). How is his retreat from the world understood by the other men around him, and how does Ruta express her own feelings of guilt and remorse? Does either of them ever fully reconcile with themselves, and with each other?
11. Can you draw any parallels between Ruta and Ruth, including in how they respond to their own marital disappointments?
12. By the end of the book, did your opinion of Ze’ev change from your first impressions of him? In what ways is he the root system of the network of families, deceits, and romances in the novel?
About this Author
One of Israel’s most celebrated novelists, MEIR SHALEV was born in 1948 on Nahalal, Israel’s first moshav. His books have been translated into more than twenty-five languages and have been best sellers in Israel, Holland, and Germany. He is also a columnist for the Israeli daily Yedioth Ahronoth. His honors include the National Jewish Book Award and the Brenner Prize, one of Israel’s top literary awards, for A Pigeon and a Boy. He has been named a Chevalier de l’Ordre des Arts et des Lettres by the French government. Shalev lives in Jerusalem and in the north of Israel.STUART SCHOFFMAN worked as a journalist at Time and as a screenwriter in Hollywood before moving to Israel in 1988. He has written about Jewish and Israeli culture and politics for many publications, including The Jerusalem Report and theJewish Review of Books. His translations from Hebrew include Beginnings by Meir Shalev, Lion’s Honey by David Grossman, and three novels by A.B. Yehoshua:Friendly Fire, The Retrospective, and The Extra.
Suggested Reading
Chinua Achebe, Things Fall ApartSaul Bellow, Herzog
Jonathan Safran Foer, Everything Is Illuminated
David Grossman, To the End of the Land
Nicole Krauss, The History of Love
Vladimir Nabokov, Ada, or Ardor