Rosh Hashanah

Rosh Hashanah is the calendar marker for a new year in Sara Goldfarb’s story, framing a small, hopeful expectation against the continuing routine of pills, calls, and anticipation that follows. The passage gives no account of a specific Rosh Hashanah observance; its significance lies in the point in time it establishes and the hope Sara attaches to it.

A New-Year Marker

The narration states that Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur have passed, and that Sara knows the year is going to be good. The holidays orient the reader in the calendar: a few weeks into the new year, perhaps more, the story shows Sara repeatedly contacting McDick Corp. about her television-show application. Rosh Hashanah therefore serves as the threshold for this period of waiting, rather than as a separately depicted scene.

Sara’s Hope and Observance

Sara’s expectation of a good year sits beside her strict observance of Yom Kippur, which she has kept in this manner for the first time in as long as she can remember. She fasts, taking only water, but exempts her pills from the prohibition on food by regarding them as medicine prescribed by a doctor. During the observance she thinks of Harry Goldfarb, feels sadness, and prays to see him again. These details belong specifically to Yom Kippur, while Rosh Hashanah supplies the larger new-year frame. The contrast between Sara’s hope and the persistent pills and anxious calls that follow gives the calendar marker a quiet irony without making the holiday itself the cause of what happens next.