World War II ended 65 years ago, but we have not heard the last of it. Especially since the collapse of the Soviet Union and the release of the film “Rape of Europa,” a number of lawsuits, news stories, international agreements, and groups have emerged, all concerning looted and lost art treasures.
Jews around the world now feel some encouragement that old wrongs against their families will receive attention and redress. We also can expect to see an increase in books on the subject, such as “After the Auction,” the debut novel by Milwaukee native Linda Frank.
Frank is a journalist and businesswoman now living in San Francisco. She spoke at the Wisconsin Society for Jewish Learning’s annual meeting Aug. 24.
Like my own mother, Frank’s protagonist Lily Kovner is a Jewish girl in Vienna. A month before Passover 1938, the Nazis raid her home and drag off not only her father but also her mother’s most valuable possession: an antique jewel-trimmed seder plate.
Her father dies at Dachau before Kristallnacht. Lily departs for London with the Kindertransport, the project to rescue Jewish children from Nazi occupied Europe. Her mother is eventually rounded up and shipped “to the East,” never to be seen again.
Half-a-century later, on a writing assignment for a magazine, Lily attends an art auction and briefly sees her mother’s seder plate for sale, before it disappears again.
It would not be right to divulge more of the story. Suffice it to say that 153 pages, three continents, two flashbacks, one murder, and a few spicy romantic scenes later, Lily solves the mystery of what became of the seder plate and who is its thief.
Frank covers a wide range of subjects: art history, art dealers and auction houses, international espionage, the “Monuments Men” (people who helped preserve cultural treasures from combat damage during the war; my father was one), the Kindertransport, the Shanghai Jewish refugee community, Mossad agents, and Scotland Yard. This is in addition to Jewish religious practices and World War II, which present enough challenges of their own.
Frank explained much about the book in her address to the WSJL, an organization in which her parents were both active. I learned more about the book during an interview earlier in the day:
That period of Jewish history, the 20th century has interested me for a long time. The book developed into a mystery a roundabout way. I based [elderly Judaica collector] Nachman Tanski on a character my mother met in World War II. When I tried to research him, nobody wanted to talk, so I knew there had to be some mystery around him, and I wanted to explore that. I wanted have a protagonist who was a woman of a certain age, and I also wanted to enhance some of the positives about Israel.
I considered many other possibilities, including “Secrets of the Afikomen,” but that sounded too much like a book for children.
I’m hoping that its appeal will reach beyond the Jewish community, to women of a certain age and anyone interested in art, World War II, and Israel.
You follow some classic rules of good mystery writing, like giving your reader clues early in the story. Do you read a lot of mystery novels?
Not really. Two authors I do like are Alan Furst and Daniel Silva. I’m looking forward to reading Silva’s new book, “The Rembrandt Affair.”
What advice would you give to someone writing on Jewish subjects for a general audience that may not understand very much about the religion and customs?
The famous rule is “Show, don’t tell,” but that is difficult. I tried to work it into the plot in a way that’s informing, and develop relationships, but I didn’t want it to sound like a university lecture.
It was important to me to make the missing art piece not just valuable but also a ritual object, and to show how it’s used within the context of Jewish life. I was also trying to do some sort of public relations service for Israel.
I had put so much time and work into this book, and I was ready to move on to the next project. Most editors are from a different generation and they do business a different way. Some of the “literary fiction” they want now is stuff I can’t even stand to read. Traditional publishers now don’t really do much more for a book than I can do myself. I worked with a developmental editor who helped a great deal.
You’ve lived in San Francisco for years and done a lot of work about China. Please help me understand why Ruth [the protagonist’s Chinese-born cousin] speaks broken English.
Chinese doesn’t have articles [like “a,” “an,” or “the”]. The story takes place 20 years ago when people in China didn’t study English the way they do now. I’ve heard many Chinese people speak that way, including my daughter-in-law.
I’d like to write something about the Jews of 19th century China.
Milwaukeean Susan Ellman, MLIS, has taught history and English composition at the high school level and is a freelance writer at work on an historical novel.
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