The Safekeep

In The Safekeep, both Isabel and Eva value the house and all the objects in it. However, their connections with the home contain significant differences—most notably, that Isabel’s family took over the home and dispossessed Eva’s family of their rightful possessions. Throughout The Safekeep, the nature of home thus emerges as a central theme, examining wider concerns involving justice and belonging.

From the beginning of the novel, Isabel demonstrates an anxious attachment to the house and its objects for two reasons. The first reason is that Isabel wishes to keep the house as a shrine to her mother. She maintains a careful inventory of the house’s objects and is constantly afraid that someone might steal something from her. She treats the objects with care and reverence, such as when she tells Henrik that the plates with the hare designs are “not for touching. They are for keeping” (3). The second reason is that Isabel fears she will eventually be turned out of the house once Louis inherits it. Isabel’s fears of losing her possessions and even the home itself echo the real dispossession and displacement experienced by Eva and her family during the war. 

Eva, by contrast, cherishes the house because it is her rightful inheritance, representative of everything that was lost during the devastation of the Holocaust.