Joyce Oates: The Gravedigger’s Daughter

It’s a blinding-bright day here in Chicago, from my aerie on the fifty-second floor of my grand new apartment building I look out upon the vast inland sea Lake Michigan. Royalties from the memoir have helped pay for this, a less “controversial” book would not have earned. Nothing more is needed, yes?

Your cousin,

Lake Worth, Florida

April 13, 1999

Dear Freyda,

Your letter meant much to me. I’m so sorry not to answer sooner. I make no excuses. Seeing this card I thought “For Freyda!”

Next time I will write more. Soon I promise.

Your cousin

Chicago IL

22 April 1999

Dear Rebecca,

Rec’d your card. Am not sure what I think of it. Americans are ga-ga for Joseph Cornell as they are for Edward Hopper. What is Lanner Waltzes ? Two little-girl doll figures riding the crest of a wave & in the background an old-fashioned sailing ship with sails billowing? Collage? I hate riddle-art. Art is to see , not to think .

Is something wrong, Rebecca? The tone of your writing is altered, I think. I hope you are not playing coy, to take revenge for my chiding letter of January. I have a doctoral student, a bright young woman not quite so bright as she fancies herself, who plays such games with me at the present time, at her own risk! I hate games, too.

(Unless they are my own.)

Your cousin,

Chicago IL

6 May 1999

Dear Cousin: Yes I think you must be angry with me! Or you are not well.

I prefer to think that you are angry. That I did insult you even in your American soft heart. If so, I am sorry. I have no copies of my letters to you & don’t recall what I said. Maybe I was wrong. When I am coldly sober, I am likely to be wrong. When drunk I am likely to be less wrong.

Enclosed here is a stamped addressed card. You need only check one of the boxes: angry not well.

Your cousin,

P.S. This Joseph Cornell Pond reminded me of you, Rebecca. A doll-like girl playing her fiddle beside a murky inlet.

Lake Worth, Florida

September 19, 1999

Dear Freyda,

How strong & beautiful you were, at the awards ceremony in Washington! I was there, in the audience at the Folger Library. I made the trip just for you.

All of the writers honored spoke very well. But none so witty & unexpected as “Freyda Morgenstern” who caused quite a stir.

I’m ashamed to say, I could not bring myself to speak to you. I waited in line with so many others for you to sign Back From the Dead & when my turn came you were beginning to tire. You hardly glanced at me, you were vexed at the girl assistant fumbling the book. I did no more than mumble “Thank you” & hurried away.

I stayed just one night in Washington, then flew home. I tire easily now, it was a mad thing to do. My husband would have prevented me if he’d known where I was headed.

During the speeches you were restless onstage, I saw your eyes wandering. I saw your eyes on me. I was sitting in the third row of the theater. Such an old, beautiful little theater in the Folger Library. I think there must be so much beauty in the world we haven’t seen. Now it is almost too late we yearn for it.

I was the gaunt-skull woman with the buzz cut. The heavy dark glasses covering half my face. Others in my condition wear gaudy turbans or gleaming wigs. Their faces are bravely made up.

In Lake Worth/Palm Beach there are many of us. I don’t mind my baldie head in warm weather & among strangers for their eyes look through me as if I am invisible. You stared at me at first & then looked quickly away & afterward I could not bring myself to address you. It wasn’t the right time, I had not prepared you for the sight of me. I shrink from pity & even sympathy is a burden to some. I had not known that I would make the reckless trip until that morning for so much depends upon how I feel each morning, it’s not predictable.

I had a present to give to you, I changed my mind & took away again feeling like a fool. Yet the trip was wonderful for me, I saw my cousin so close! Of course I regret my cowardice now, its too late.

You asked about my father. I will tell you no more than that I do not know my father’s true name. “Jacob Schwart” was what he called himself & so I was “Rebecca Schwart” but that name was lost long ago. I have another more fitting American name, & I have also my husband’s last name, only to you, my cousin, am I identified as “Rebecca Schwart.” Well, I will tell you one more thing: in May 1949 my father who was the gravedigger murdered your aunt Anna and wished to murder me but failed, he turned the shotgun onto himself & killed himself when I was thirteen struggling with him for the gun & my strongest memory of that time was his face in the last seconds & what remained of his face, his skull & brains & the warmth of his blood splattered onto me.

I have never told anyone this, Freyda. Please do not speak of it to me, if you write again.

Your cousin

(I did not intend to write such an ugly thing, when I began this letter.)

Chicago IL

23 September 1999

Dear Rebecca,

I’m stunned. That you were so close to me-and didn’t speak.

And what you tell me of-What happened to you at age thirteen.

I don’t know what to say. Except yes I am stunned. I am angry, & hurt. Not at you, I don’t think I am angry at you but at myself.

I’ve tried to call you. There is no “Rebecca Schwart” in the Lake Worth phone directory. Of course, you’ve told me there is no “Rebecca Schwart.” Why in hell have you never told me your married name? Why are you so coy? I hate games, I don’t have time for games.

Yes I am angry with you. I am upset & angry you are not well. (You never returned my card. I waited & waited & you did not.)

Can I believe you about “Jacob Schwart”! We conclude that the ugliest things are likely to be true.

In my memoir that isn’t so. When I wrote it, forty-five yrs later it was a text I composed of words chosen for “effect.” Yes there are true facts in Back From the Dead . But facts are not “true” unless explained. My memoir had to compete with other memoirs of its type & so had to be “original.” I am accustomed to controversy, I know how to tweak noses. The memoir makes light of the narrator’s pain & humiliation. It’s true, I did not feel that I would be one of those to die; I was too young, & ignorant, & compared to others I was healthy. My big blond sister Elzbieta the relatives so admired, looking like a German girl-doll, soon lost all that hair & her bowels turned to bloody suet. Joel died trampled to death, I would learn afterward. What I say of my mother Dora Morgenstern is truthful only at the start. She was not a kapo but one hoping to cooperate with the Nazis to help her family (of course) & other Jews. She was a good organizer & much trusted but never so strong as the memoir has her. She did not say those cruel things, I have no memory of anything anyone said to me except orders shouted by authorities. All the quiet spoken words, the very breath of our lives together, was lost. But a memoir must have spoken words, & a memoir must breathe life.

I am so famous now-infamous! In France this month I am a new bestseller. In the U.K. (where they are outspoken anti-Semites which is refreshing!) my word is naturally doubted yet still the book sells.

Rebecca, I must speak with you. I will enclose my number here. I will wait for a call. Past 10 P.M. of any night is best, I am not so cold-sober & nasty.

Your cousin,

P.S. Are you taking chemotherapy now? What is the status of your condition? Please answer .

Lake Worth, Florida

October 8

Dear Freyda,

Don’t be angry with me, I have wanted to call you. There are reasons I could not but maybe I will be stronger soon & I promise, I will call.