The Shawl

Cynthia Ozick’s The Shawl is actually two separate (though interrelated) narratives: a short story set during the Holocaust, and a novella set roughly 40 years later in Miami, Florida. In the short story, also titled “The Shawl,” a young Jewish woman named Rosa Lublin is sent with her niece Stella and her infant daughter Magda to a concentration camp. Against all odds, Magda survives much longer than her mother expects, thanks largely to the shawl Rosa wraps her in, shielding her from the view of the camp guards and providing her with something to suck on after Rosa loses the ability to breastfeed. Stella, however, is jealous of Rosa’s devotion to her daughter and eventually steals the shawl from Magda to use as a blanket. Distraught, Magda wanders out of the camp barracks, where she is spotted by a camp guard. Before Rosa can reach her daughter, the guard throws Magda against the camp’s electric fence, killing her.

The novella, “Rosa,” picks up this story more than 30 years later. Rosa has recently moved to Miami after tearing apart the antique store she had previously run in New York City.