44 pages • 1 hour read
Geraldine BrooksPeople of the Book
Fiction | Novel | Adult | Published in 2008A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Chapter 8Chapter Summaries & Analyses
Chapter 8 Summary: “Saltwater: Tarragona, 1492”
This chapter opens in Tarragona, a region of what is now Spain, in 1492. The main character is David Ben Shoushan, a Jewish sofer or holy book writer. David becomes entranced by some illuminations being sold by a deaf-mute orphan boy in the market, who was brought with his slave from the war-torn regions of Andalusia. David buys the illuminations, though he doesn’t have the money, in order to put them in a Haggadah he is making for the wedding of his nephew, a prominent member of the Jewish community.
Soon, the family is torn apart by the knowledge that David’s son, a convert to Christianity who is now married to a Christian olive oil maker named Rosa, has been taken in by the Inquisitor for keeping Jewish relics in his home. David tries to ask his wealthy brother-in-law for money for the ransom, but his brother-in-law is spending every dollar on a bribe to convince the King and Queen of Spain, Isabel and Ferdinand, to stop their plan to force the Jews to flee Spain. The inability to pay the ransom has harsh consequences for Rosa's mother and father; David is killed by the Inquisitor's guards; Miriam is left alone; and Ruti flees to avoid being arrested.
Ruti, who is a secret student of the Kabbalah and a devout Jew, takes the Haggadah from the bookbinder, her lover, who secrets her away in the night to protect her. She goes to a cave where she often went to study at night and finds Rosa, her brother’s wife, in labor. Ruti helps Rosa birth the baby, but he appears stillborn. Rosa is happy the baby is dead, and Ruti is appalled by her, thinking, “How dare a mother rejoice in her own infant’s death?” (254). The baby begins to breathe and blink, and Ruti takes it away in her arms, hiding it, telling Rosa she will bury it in a Jewish cemetery.
The proclamation comes down about the forced exile of the Jews. Ruti decides to take a ship to another land and take the baby with her. She performs the sacred rites of the Jewish faith on the baby, dipping him in ocean water and getting a few drops of saltwater on the Haggadah, which hangs from a sling on her back.
Chapter 8 Analysis
Names play a prominent role in this chapter, where the name of Reuben Ben Shoushan, the son of David Ben Shoushan, exiles him from his own family and connects him to a Christian lineage. The refusal to use names indicates a rejection of this newfound identity. While under interrogation, Reuben insists on being called Renato, saying, “I was baptized Renato. My name is Renato del Salvador.” The Father insists, “‘Reuben Ben Shoushan,’ the priest repeated, as if he had not heard” (225). By rejecting Reuben’s Christian name, the priest is also rejecting Reuben as a Christian; he is declaring his new identity illegitimate.
Characters also experience the struggle of exile in this chapter, when Jews are forced to leave Spain and move to safer lands away from the Inquisitor. Though Ruti physically leaves her home, she refuses to be spiritually exiled—preserving her sense of self and continuing her religion by giving her brother’s infant son a ritual immersion and making him a Jew as well: “[T]hat night, Jews were being forced to the baptismal font, driven to conversion by fear of exile. Ruti, exultant, defiant, had made a Gentile into a Jew” (258). Though Ruti faces exile, she remains true to herself and is able to preserve her history and culture by embracing life in a new land. Brooks presents two kinds of exile in this chapter—physical and spiritual exile. To avoid losing her sense of self, Ruti loses her home to begin a new life across the ocean.
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By Geraldine Brooks
