The Two Fathers

This thread explores the contrasting paternal failures of Shaltiel Abravanel and Gershom Wald through Atalia and Shmuel’s experiences.

increasingBearing stren­gth in each eventdecreasing

A Girl Without Questions

Abravanel’s Distance Provision Without Intimacy Shaltiel gives Atalia money when asked but rarely asks where she has been or what she needs. Lectures Instead He explains history and politics instead of telling her stories or sharing ordinary life. His intellectual seriousness leaves his daughter emotionally unrecognized.

A Father’s Political Exile

Dissent at Home Public Rupture Abravanel is expelled from political leadership after opposing the creation of a separate Jewish state. Domestic Retreat He withdraws into the house and eventually destroys his papers. His political defeat and his failure as a father become intertwined in the household’s silence.

Wald’s Inherited Guilt

A Father’s Responsibility Raising a Soldier Wald recalls teaching Mija to admire earlier fighters and to answer the call to defend the community. Self-Condemnation He believes that his own words helped make Mija’s death possible. His grief is not only loss; it is an accusation against his former convictions.

A Substitute Household

Shmuel Among the Elders Shared Enclosure Shmuel’s conversations with Wald and his attraction to Atalia place him inside a household shaped by absent parents and dead children. Recognition Wald sees Shmuel as vulnerable, while Shmuel responds to Wald’s grief with care rather than argument alone. Their relationship hints at belonging without pretending to repair either man’s past.

No Simple Adoption

Affection With Limits A Farewell Gesture Wald kisses Shmuel’s forehead, and Atalia gives him a small keepsake. Return to Uncertainty Neither offers him a permanent place in the family, and Shmuel leaves for the south. The household offers real tenderness but cannot undo the earlier fractures that shaped it.

Atalia’s adolescence

1947 and the years after

After Mija’s death

Winter 1959–1960

The final departure