Kantika, the latest novel by accomplished Boston College author and professor of English Elizabeth Graver, is a multi-generational family saga taking place in four countries.
Rebecca Cohen, the spirited protagonist of Kantika, comes from an elite Sephardic Jewish family of early 20th-century Istanbul, but the establishment of the Turkish republic and subsequent loss of the Cohens鈥� fortune compels them to relocate to Spain, drastically changing the life she had expected to lead. Rebecca endures a failed marriage while working as a seamstress, concealing her ethno-religious identity in a country that had expelled Jews four centuries ago and is still hostile to them. Her odyssey takes her to Cuba for an arranged second marriage, then to New York City, and she undertakes the challenge of raising鈥攁nd empowering鈥攈er disabled stepdaughter.
Kantika is replete with elements of the various landscapes, cultures, and languages Rebecca encounters and processes over the years鈥攆rom Ladino to Castilian to Hebrew to English, among others鈥攁s she contemplates her personal and familial identity, and how much of it will be passed along to future generations. Music in particular is prominent in Kantika, which is Ladino for 鈥渟ong.鈥� Graver also sets Rebecca鈥檚 story in a universal context about the tenacity and resilience of women as they undertake a multiplicity of roles while seeking fulfillment.
The book was a complicated one in many respects for Graver. Its inspiration came from interviews with her grandmother, Rebecca n茅e Cohen Baruch Levy, who was the namesake for the Rebecca in Kantika and whose life followed a very similar path, including the four primary geographical settings of the book. But the story Graver began writing wound up in an uncertain territory.
Elizabeth Graver (Caitlin Cunningham)
鈥淭he question was, 鈥業s this fiction or not?鈥欌�� she explained. 鈥淚 didn鈥檛 have the necessary information or details to make it a work of non-fiction, and yet here I was incorporating these non-fictional aspects of my grandmother鈥檚 life into what I was writing. At some point, it wasn鈥檛 just my grandmother鈥檚 story, or my version of it, that I was telling. I had started inhabiting the consciousness of characters inspired by other ancestors.
鈥沦辞, Kantika became an improvisation between fact, fiction, research, dreams, texts, photographs, real names and invented ones, my grandmother and myself.聽 However it might be classified, I hope it sheds light on the Sephardic experience in America, which hasn鈥檛 been explored much, especially in fiction.聽 I鈥檝e had some fascinating conversations with historians of Sephardic life, as well as with musicians with Ladino repertoires. The interdisciplinarity of the project has been a treat.鈥�
Finishing a book is always an emotional experience, said Graver, Kantika particularly so because of the familial connection. Graver鈥檚 grandmother died many years before she began writing the manuscript, and the generation after that of her grandmother is now well into old age. Graver is grateful to her two uncles who provided biographical details she used in incorporating them as characters in the book; she was able to read portions of the book to one of them before he died. 聽
鈥淚 felt a pang about leaving this world鈥攊t鈥檚 been so moving and interesting鈥攂ut I鈥檓 glad that some of my relatives who played a part in the real-life story could witness the story I spun,鈥� she said.
For more on Graver鈥檚 work, see her website at .
Sean Smith | University Communications | May 2023