I haven't checked the weather yet, but I know it is the perfect day to chat about adult Jewish literature. I'm Sheryl Stahl, thanks for joining me here at Nice Jewish books. Today. I am so happy to welcome Maya Arad, the author of the Hebrew teacher, which is a book with three novellas the Hebrew teacher, A Visit, and Make New Friends. So welcome, Maya.
Thank you so much. I'm glad to be here,
and I'm glad to have you. I loved each of the three novellas. They were all so moving, and I was able to connect to them in very different ways. I just love them,
thanks.
So I would like to start with the middle one, called a visit, and then in parentheses, scenes. So as the title suggests, it's told in short scenes rotating among the characters. So can you kind of set up the story for that one?
Yeah.. So the story is about, basically about a grandmother in her late 70s, Miriam, who is coming from Israel to visit her son in Silicon Valley, her middle aged son, his much younger wife, her daughter in law and her grandson, Yonatan, whom she's never seen before. She's basically coming to see her grandson. And Miriam is not very close with her son, which is an understatement. In fact, you know, he left 20 years ago, and he barely visited since, and this is her first visit in Silicon Valley, and she doesn't understand what she's seeing. Everything is so strange and unfamiliar, even the products at the supermarket, or, you know, the setting of the preschool where her grandson goes, and she's trying to explain things to herself. It seems to her that her son is doing very well. He has two cars and he has a two story house. So, you know, coming from Israel, you know, it seems to her, Oh, he made it! Gradually. as she sees and hears things, she realizes that there are some deep cracks in this perfect facade that she thought she was seeing. And the story alternates between Miriam's point of view, her son Yoram point of view, and her daughter in law, Maya's point of view. And I think it was important for me, you know, I think when you live in Silicon Valley as an Israeli, having family over is a very basic experience. And when you have family visiting, no matter how close you are, it's always a feeling of somebody's watching you, somebody's looking at your way of life, which is not the way they do it in Israel, and observing you and comparing. I mean, is it better than in Israel? Did you make the right choice? So I think this tension. A lot of Israelis expats really identified with this story, because they felt that this experience of relatives who are visiting you and observing you is very common to all of us. Now, of course, this is an extreme case of, you know, family estrangement, but I chose it because, you know, you write about the more interesting cases, more extreme cases, right?
Of course, and that's the issue, is that all is not perfect with them. So not only do they feel like we're living a normal life and someone's watching us, but we're living a strained and difficult life and someone's watching us.
That's right, yes, and it was very important for me when I wrote this story that I don't want it to be the kind of story of, oh, the suffering poor grandmother and the mean daughter in law, or anything like that. These are really three people who are whose life is not very easy and they're having a hard time, you know, staying together in a small house for three weeks. The grandmother just told them she's coming for three weeks, not asking if it's a good timing. So, so you know, all those cracks and strains are showing up, and just like, you know, in real life,
well, there's also a secret that they're hiding. And is that a spoiler to talk about that?
Not so much, because it's not this kind of story, right? It's not a detective story. But yes, I said before that, Miriam thinks, Oh, my son really made it. And it turns out that he really, he really did make it once. [then] he made an exit with a company that he founded. But, you know, he spent the money not wisely, and now he's basically, you know, working in a company, in a for a job for which he's overqualified just to make ends meet. And this is something that Yoram and his wife don't want his mother to know, but in the end, she does find out, and I think it makes things you know easier and brings them somewhat closer.
Yeah, I think Maya just gets exhausted from keeping this secret, and finally, just sort of spills it all.
That's what I wanted the story to be about. Yeah, not, you know, not something very dramatic. But you know, how life really is. People who read the story told me I was expecting something different. It was I was expecting, you know, for three weeks. You know, they're simmering in this pot I was hoping for, you know, a big dramatic event, like a big fight or anything. And this is not what's happening. It's just, you know, a story about life, but that's what I wanted to write in.
And there's also this little counterpoint that Miriam had befriended a woman on the plane, Malka.
Malka, yes, and her daughter in law, Ravit,
who's also traveling to see her son and daughter in law and grandchildren. But it's a very different picture there. She has a very warm relationship with her daughter in law, who's very open and bubbly and welcoming. And so with Maya and Yoram basically just doing their own thing and ignoring Miriam, they end up taking her out and, you know, going just shopping or coffee or just to hang out so at the time that she's desperately this is exactly what she wants in her relationship with with her family.
So Malka and her daughter in law, Ravit, are the complete opposite of Miriam and her daughter in law, Maya. Ravit is very friendly. She's not only she's so warm to her own mother in law, she also, you know, she takes on Miriam, as long as they go around and have coffee and do their shopping. And this is very enviable for Miriam, but she also understands that this is a very rare relationship. This is not the usual case. And actually, since you mentioned the name of the novella, visit scenes in Hebrew. The name was the visit a visit pictures. And this it referred to, you know, there's a theme, recurring theme of pictures in the story, right? Miriam comes and immediately she wants to see photos of her grandson. But, you know, there are no there's no photo album. Everything is on on the phone or on the computer, and she wants to have, like, a real album. And in the end, it's Ravit, Malka's, daughter in law, who is arranging pictures for Miriam and making her an album, you know, an electronic one that's printed on demand so she can show all her friends. This is my grandson. So yeah, so even in this respect, they're the they're the family replacement for her,
one thing that kind of cracked open the facade and allowed them to do a little healing was revealing the the truth about their financial situation and Yoram's working situation, but also Yonatan and Yoram end up getting sick, and they are forced to rely on Miriam, since Maya can't take care of both of them, and in a way that allows Miriam to reconnect with Yoram a little bit - that she's there to be the mother you know to be Mommy, you know, not the observing, judgmental coming from Israel person, but just to be there as mom.
That's right. And if you remember correctly, the story begins in the first scene, Yoram is coming to pick up his mother at the airport, and he sees her, and he has to say ima, mom, but the words don't come out of his mouth. He can't say this word. And at the very last thing was, when he's in the hospital and he sees her there, there, he finally can say ima, you know, he can call her. He he's a child again. He relies on her. He calls her. And of course, you know, it's not a Hollywood ending that now everybody will be close, but you know, it is some kind of repairing of the relationship. I hope
I definitely saw it as a step in the right direction, you know, a healing that needs more. But yeah, you know, it's a start. Yeah, I thought it was a beautiful ending. It was beautiful.
Thank you.
So I'd like to go back to the first story then, which was the toughest for me to kind of come up with some questions in the Hebrew Teacher. Ilana is a woman nearing retirement age who has built a Hebrew department at a local university along with the professors there, and has had close relationships with people in the university and in the community for years, but her department head retired, and the department has been diminishing over the years. Interest has just waned from the 70s when it started, and so there are two major issues. On one hand, she's watching this beloved department that she put her heart and soul into, you know, diminish and possibly disappear. And on the other hand, they hire a person to take over who's nothing like the warm, communicative person who's retiring. And this is such a painful rift in the Jewish community right now that I wasn't even sure how to describe him. So could you describe Yoad, who's the the incoming professor, right?
So yes, I can do that, but I really like the way you describe the story, because you started with Ilana nearing retirement and looking at her life's work losing relevance. There are less and less students. For me, this is the heart of the story. Of course, it's about Hebrew. It's about the political situation. It's about kind of a rift that you know, the story was written nine years ago, but the rift has become so much more prominent these days.
I was going to ask you when you wrote it,
we can talk about that later, but it's really about, you know, getting older, nearing retirement, seeing that what used to work 30 or 40 years ago doesn't work so much. Today. There's less interest in Hebrew. And it's not only less interest in Hebrew, there's less interest in Italian, in Russian, in the humanities, in general. I can see that, you know, I know live in an academic environment, there are less and less students who are interested in the humanities. So it's really not about Hebrew. I wrote about Hebrew because this is what I know, what I'm close to, but it's a general thing, and it's something that I feel as a Hebrew writer too. You know, Hebrew literature was at its height in the 1980s maybe 1990s and today, there are still many good books being written, and I'm very grateful to be there. But of course, we have there's TV, there's other things to do. People read less. So it's a general thing, and I just chose to write about Hebrew, now about Ilana and the new professor, Yoad. So again, is the complete opposite of Ilana. Ilana loves Hebrew. Loves Hebrew literature. She loves Israel. She can be critical at times. But of course, she stands with Israel no matter what. Yoad, he is the complete opposite. First of all, he was hired as a professor of Hebrew and Jewish literature. But when Ilana asks him about what he's doing, he says, Oh, I don't read literature. It's not interesting to me. I'd rather read philosophy, history, some psychoanalysis, not literature. I read only if I really need to. So he's not even interested in literature. And, of course, you know, he's defines himself, I think, as a post Zionist or a non Zionist. And his political views are very extreme. He's also, you know, he's, it's not that, you know, I can see his side too. I belong to the Israeli left, and I think that in recent years, terrible things are happening in Israel. But Yoad goes as far as to support BDS. He signs a petition of the college that calls for Boycott Divestment and sanctioning. That's the s for I think so it's not surprising that he and Ilana are, you know, on a collision track. And I don't think anybody who reads the story doesn't is surprised by what happened, by what is happening. In the end, it's just that, you know, you can't take your eyes off these two trains that are about to collide, Ilana and Yoad. And of course, you are Yoad is a very abrasive and unpleasant person, sometimes even, you know, rude. For example, He refuses to have anything to do with the Jewish community or even with Hillel. He says that's not part of my job. When he's being asked to talk to the local Jewish Book Club, he says, I have no interest in entertaining a gaggle of old ladies. But it's not that Ilana is perfect. It really takes two to tango. Ilana is very naive, so much that she's completely blind to. Another person's point of view. She's so convinced that her way of seeing things is right, she cannot think that somebody else might think differently. I think one of the most difficult moments in this story for Ilana is when she complains about Yoad to her own son, Barak, who is about Yoad's age. He tells her, ima, you're used to seeing the old folks at your synagogue. Young people today have different views about Israel. So even her own son, you know, thinks differently from her, and she cannot see it. Ilana is also, you know, very, you know, didactic. She tries to educate your ad, tell him what he has to do. Lecture to him, so you can see why the two of them are really incompatible. And you know, in the end, one of them will have to go, Does this answer your question?
Yeah, yeah, right. And I can totally see Ilana's point of view from that that she helped build this program, and so she wants to indoctrinate him in how this program was put together and her feelings about it. And you know, as you said, she couldn't see that someone else coming in would have a different idea about what the program would look like, right, let alone that it would be so different from her idea,
right? And of course, you know, universities are very hierarchical institutions, and your ad is young, and they on the tenure track, he's faculty, and Ilana is considered an adjuvant instructor or staff. So it's obvious who has the power and who hasn't, so, which is very sad, but that's the way it is.
And he's very much an intellectual snob, and that's really why the university hired him. You know, they wanted that high intellect,
right? Or what, or what they think is a high intellect, right? Because I read a story to my daughter when it was just published. She was, I think, 14, and she said, But Mom, if it's like this, why? Why do they want him so much? And I told her, Oh, I'll have to explain to you the problem with the humanities these days. It will take too long, but unfortunately, very often,
they're always looking for a prestige hire, right?
Not necessarily with much intellectual content.
So and on your last novella, Make New Friends. This one just got me in the heart. So, okay, you tell what, the story is, okay?
So I think the center of the story is the relationship of a mother in her 40s, Efrat, who is an Israeli immigrant living in Palo Alto, and her American born daughter, Libby, who struggles in middle school socially, and Efrat is desperate to help her daughter make new friends, and, you know, find her way. But her intentions are very well meant, but the results, not so much. And I think in the end of the story, the question arises, who has to make new friends? Libby, the daughter, or the mother, maybe Efrat would get, you know, a life of her own. And I think this story was particularly close to me because I'm also, you know, an Israeli immigrant living in California, and I had two teenage daughters at the time when I was writing this story. And it seems to me that the normal generational gap that every parent and child has was intensified a lot, first by, you know, the fact that I grew up in Israel and they were growing up in America, so I did not go through the American middle school. I had no idea that when you get to middle school, there's no class "one" classroom for you. You move from one class to another, there is no teacher that you could call your teacher, right? There are only different teachers who teach different things. There's a counselor, sure, but there's no teacher who is your teacher. And I had no idea that everything depends so much on you know who you sit at lunch with, because there's no classroom as it is. So this was one thing, and the other thing is, of course, the technological gap. Because when I was growing up, there were no smartphones. And this changes so much, because first of all, a lot of the bullying is being done online these days, and smartphones absolutely right, and smartphones have a way of connecting you and simultaneously disconnect you. So for example, you're sending your friends, your friend the picture. Here I am at the party. So you're connecting because, hey, I'm thinking of you. I sent you this picture. But also you're disconnecting because, hey, I was invited to this party, and you. Weren't. So it's all a very subtle dance of, you know, connecting, disconnecting, showing off, connecting with the right people, and the mother does not understand it, and when she understands it, she wants to help her daughter fit in, and things don't work the right way.
Yeah, that was the note I had. Is that the smartphone is a double edged sword, that if she doesn't have it, then her friends can't reach her to even invite her, but then it also shows that, well, they could have reached her, but didn't, but didn't invite her.
That's right, yes, so at the beginning of the story, Libby is the only girl in her class who doesn't have a smartphone, and her mother thinks that that's how she She protects her from being rejected. And the father said, Look, we have to give her a phone. Everybody has one. She can't connect with her friends, and Efrat says, so you think if she has a phone, then all of a sudden everybody will invite her. No, it would just be so obvious that she's out. So this was a question, the question that they had to deal with. And I think at some point, Efrat feels so lost that she goes to her friend Ronnie, who is also an Israeli mother, but more experienced with older kids, and she tells her, please explain it to me. I don't understand what's going on. And Ronnie explains the situation to her and how middle school works and how smartphones work. And they talk about how it's different from their own childhood. And Ronnie says, Remember when we were in middle school, if there was a party for the popular kids, you would hear some talking about it before or after. But now, when they don't get invited, they get pictures from the party straight into their smartphone. When the party is going on, it's just so in your face this, you know, rejection and social hierarchy,
yeah, and talking about social hierarchy. So she has a she's in a circle of not quite friends. She's sort of the token outcast of the circle, so they put up with her sometimes, but it's always clear that she's the low person on the totem pole, that she's the expendable one, so it's kind of like she's there to show how close the rest of them are.
That's right, yes. So at the beginning of the story, Efrat takes the shopping, and then they meet a few girls from the same group who are doing shopping together. And Efrat wonders, how come she sits with them at lunch and she gets invited to their birthday party? So why don't they call her when they go around shopping? Why? When she tries to, you know, have, you know, a one on one date with one of them? They don't even react to her messages. And gradually, you know, her friend explains it to her, yes, every group has, you know, somebody at the bottom of the hierarchy. That's how it works. And her Ronnie, her friend, says, At least she has she belongs to some kind of group. Some people don't belong to any group. It's a very cruel world, the world of, you know, middle school, yeah,
I was thinking, if she didn't have bad friends, she wouldn't have any friends at all.
That's right. But in the end, she does find her way, and hopefully her mother will find her way too.
So one common theme through all of these was really that trying to figure out how to connect to people that we all want to connect in the ways that we know, obviously, because that's the way that we know, and how hard it is when other people are coming from a different direction.
That's a very interesting comment. You see, I never thought about it when I was writing the stories, but now that you say it, I see that you're right. Yes, yes. So yes. In some cases, Ilana knows one mode of communication right, and she doesn't know. She doesn't understand that she needs to change in order to be able to communicate with your ad. In some cases, like in the case of Miriam, the grandmother her son and daughter in law are trying to avoid communication. So it's really a different story. And I think, yes, I think Efrat and Libby, her daughter, this is again, you know, if a needs to learn how to make friends as an adult, how to communicate with people, it is a common thing. Yes.
So is there anything you would like to bring up that I haven't thought to ask about?
Wow, that's a little difficult for me to think. You know, off the top of my head, I actually so you. I wrote 12 books in Hebrew, and the Hebrew teacher is the first book that came out in translation. So I want to mention the translator, Jessica Cohen, who is a wonderful translator, and I really enjoyed the process of working with her on the translation, because she works very hard, and she sends me questions, and I answer her, and we discuss every little detail and really think together how to produce an English text that would best represent the Hebrew text that I wrote.
So do you feel that she captured your voice?
Absolutely yes, and I can tell you also that my daughter, who speaks Hebrew very well, but she reads very slowly. So I read the Hebrew out loud to her when the book came out, and then she read Jessica's translation, and she said, Oh, the English is better. So I can tell my daughter thinks the translation is even better than the original. So that's one thing I wanted to mention. And my most recent novel that came out last year in Israel under the title Shanim Tovot is going to appear with new vessel press in the summer of 2025 under the title, Happy New Years.
Oh, wonderful. Is that with the same translator?
Yes, Jessica is working on it right now.
That's awesome. I look forward to reading that one.
Yeah. I'm very happy about that. Yeah,
so did you have to do research into any of the stories are with these all from personal experience and imagination.
So the first story, the Hebrew teacher, and also the third one, and Make New Friends. I wrote about things that I know very, very well. You know, universities, Hebrew instruction, raising children in Silicon Valley. I didn't have to do any research for the second story, a visit. I did do a little bit of research, because Yoram works in tech, and I know very little about this industry, about, you know, what kind of jobs are there? What kind of tracks? How come somebody can make money and still lose it? So I talked to two friends who are tech people, but also love writing, and they explained everything to me and answered my questions.
So I always ask if someone were to either use your book or as a call to action for tiknolam, for repairing the world, or just to give you a soapbox moment of any cause that you would like to bring forward. What would that be?
Oh, if I had to choose one, it would be, please go vegetarian, don't eat meat. Or, if you can't do that, eat less meat.
Oh, really, okay. Why is that?
That's really important. I mean, I think I I've been a vegetarian since I was 14. I'm trying to go vegan. It's difficult for me, but I'm getting there. I really think that, you know, there's so much suffering in the world, and there's absolutely no need for animals to suffer in industrial farming or, you know, in slaughterhouses, just in order for people to eat meat.
Okay, thank you for that. If someone wants to contact you, what is the best way?
Oh, email, definitely. And you can find me online if you Google me at Stanford University, but I can also give you the address. It's my initial, M and my last name, Arad, (one word) @stanford.edu
Awesome. Well, Maya Arad, thank you so much for speaking to me about your book, The Hebrew teacher, the three novellas, and good luck on your next project.
Thank you so much. Sheryl, it was my pleasure
if you are interested in any of the books we discussed today, you can find them at your favorite board and brick or online bookstore or at your local library, thanks to Di Yan Key for use of his Freilich, which definitely makes me happy. This podcast is a project of the Association of Jewish libraries. And you can find more about it at www.jewishlibraries.org/nice Jewish books. I would like to thank ajl and my podcast mentor, Heidi Rabinowitz, Keep listening for the promo for her latest episode.
This is Leslie Newman, author of Joyful Song, a naming story, which is beautifully illustrated by Susan gall and published by Levine quirido Susan and. I will soon be joining you on the Book of Life podcast, and we would like to dedicate our episode to our fabulous editor and publisher, Arthur Levine, who is not only a rock star in the world of children's literature, but a true Mensch as well.
The Book of Life is the sister podcast of nice Jewish books. I'm your host. Heidi Rabinowitz and I podcast about Jewish kidlit join me to hear my June 2024 conversation with Leslie a Newman and Susan gall about joyful song at Book of Life podcast.com
