Kantika

Sultana Cohen is the protagonist’s generous, optimistic, devout, and loving mother. She is born into a wealthy family, and Alberto is a rich man when she marries him. Rather than taking her prosperity for granted, Sultana is actively involved in charitable efforts in Constantinople, such as donating to a Jewish orphanage. She strives to teach Rebecca and the rest of her children the importance of generosity: “Their parents call this benadamlik—to be a good person” (7). Sultana retains her optimism as the Cohen family’s fortunes change. Even though Spain is as unfamiliar to her as it is to Alberto, she takes the news that they will be moving to Barcelona with joy because it means that their sons won’t be conscripted. Alberto admires her positivity, which contrasts with his tendency toward pessimism: “[F]or his wife the world is naturally a place of blooming, and it’s the sorrows that surprise her, despite their regular appearance, not the joys” (51). Sultana is affectionate while Alberto can be emotionally distant, which causes her to function as the glue of the family. After the Cohens move to Spain, she helps her loved ones by watching her grandsons so Rebecca can work and encouraging Alberto to hold onto his faith. Despite the drastic fall in her fortunes, Sultana remains a kind and giving wife and mother.

Sultana makes important contributions to the novel’s themes and motifs. For example, an important moment for the motif of gardening occurs when she empties out the suitcase of seeds and bulbs Alberto brought from Turkey: “The garden has always been Alberto’s world, but how hard can it be to untangle the roots, lay the bulbs out in a row on the nearby patio stones, turn toward the garden bed, fill her fists with weeds and tug?” (89). Her actions help Alberto literally and figuratively put down roots in Barcelona and to try and make the city a home for his family. War and bureaucracy separate her family, and one of the last letters Rebecca receives from her mother makes her loneliness painfully clear: “I count the days until I see you again. I count the days” (225). After Sultana’s death, Rebecca holds onto her memory as a source of comfort. This connects to the novel’s use of song as a motif for Cultural Preservation Amidst Change. Sultana sings her children Ladino lullabies, and Rebecca feels connected to her mother when she sings them to her own children decades later.

When the protagonist’s father, Alberto Cohen, is introduced, he is fickle and careless, but he becomes shrewd and protective after a humbling change in his circumstances. During Rebecca’s childhood, her father holds a prominent place in Constantinople: “[W]hile he is not tall in stature, he seems tall because of how other men tip their hats to him or clap him on the shoulder” (4). Perhaps the greatest example of his inconstancy is his decision to leave his first wife, Djentil Nahon, after she is unable to have children. He lacks commitment in his business endeavors as well: “It was a deep, oddly forbidden pleasure to leave work in the middle of the day and hide in the garden for an hour or so when no one was home” (23). The family fortune shrinks due to Alberto’s carelessness, and he is unable to regain ownership of his factory after the war because he misplaces the deed. After the Cohens move to Barcelona, Alberto becomes more fearful and protective. This is seen when he has broken glass placed on the wall around the synagogue. He also demonstrates greater shrewdness during his time in Spain. He negotiates with the filmmaker, Caballero, for a Jewish cemetery in Barcelona: “Bring me a letter of permission from the municipality, señor. Then we can discuss your film” (133). This is a personal triumph for Alberto as well as for the Jewish community in Barcelona as a whole. However, in a tragic twist, Alberto is buried in the cemetery after he dies from malnutrition during the Spanish Civil War, but his wife is interred elsewhere.

As the head of the family, Alberto makes choices and mistakes that shape the Cohens’ lives for generations to come. He is the person most directly responsible for the loss of the family fortune, but he is also the victim of forces beyond his control, such as two world wars. Still, Rebecca blames him for taking the family out of Turkey when his brother was able to stay behind and prosper: “How she mourns him, hates him (loves him)” (62). In some ways, their dynamic mirrors Rebecca’s complicated parent-child relationship with her stepdaughter, Luna. Alberto becomes embittered after the family relocates to Barcelona, and he goes about the hard manual labor of his role as the synagogue’s caretaker “with a mix of martyrdom and fury, or maybe penitence or its performance” (60). The news that he is a grandfather changes him, and he realizes that taking responsibility for his family’s circumstances means not just physically working to support them but being emotionally present for them as well. Alberto develops the theme of displacement through his decision to bring his family to Spain and his longing for Turkey, which will always be home to him: “His father is there, but he is not. The soil is there, but his wife, children and grandchildren are not. God is there, but he is not” (132). In another major contribution to the plot, he begs Corinne to find an American husband for Rebecca, which leads to her meeting and marrying Sam. He is motivated by signs of mounting antisemitism and a desire to preserve his family’s culture. As he tells Rebecca, “I know this is no life for your children. They don’t know who they are, they have to hide” (144). Although his arc is marked by displacement and decline, Alberto strives to adapt and care for his loved ones even when their lives are uprooted by forces beyond his control.

The reserved, bitter, and perceptive David Baruch is Rebecca’s eldest child. David is a quiet individual who tends to keep to himself. While living in Astoria, he has difficulty expressing himself in English and connecting with his peers: He feels “thick-jawed, stuttery and bent with nostalgia like an old man, stuck in fifth grade when he belongs in sixth” (209). He resents that he had to leave his beloved grandmother and his home in Spain to join his mother in the United States, especially when she seems to prefer her younger children over him. Although David doesn’t discuss his own feelings often, he is perceptive of others’ emotions, including the ones they try to conceal. For example, he understands that his mother hopes to find a semblance of the home she left behind in Turkey when she goes to the synagogue: “The truth is that what she is looking for—David understands instinctively because he feels it, too—is nowhere to be found in America” (220). Although he keeps to himself, David is keenly observant of the people around him.

David’s storyline adds to the themes of displacement and cultural preservation. Whereas the older generations of the Cohen family see Spain as their place of exile or even consider the country cursed, David is born there and sees Barcelona as his home. In Chapter 13, David’s perspective allows the author to depict a naval battle in World War II. In addition to adding suspense to the novel, this provides an up-close look at one of the major historical events that impact the characters’ lives. Although David survives a bombing, he loses his faith: “[A]fter witnessing what happens to his fellow sailors that day and the sheer randomness of how events play out, he will no longer believe in God” (263). Despite this, serving in the Navy helps him preserve his culture and act on his desire to protect the world’s Jewish population. David adds another perspective to the novel’s multigenerational examination of the Cohen family and the meaning of home.