Yulia Marfutova: Novel about Jewish women and memories in Kiel!

Yulia Marfutova: Novel about Jewish women and memories in Kiel!

At the back of the literary landscape, the young author Yulia Marfutova has brought a breath of fresh air with her new novel “A chance is at most a bird the size of a sparrow” (144 pages, 22 euros). Loud kn-online.de The story is told by two plush mice who act as careful narrators and enable a journey through time to Moscow in the 1980s. Marfutova weaves her narrative through family stories and individual fates and combines reality with fantastic elements.

At the center is a family over three generations, with the ambitious engineer Nina, her daughter Marina and her granddaughters. While Nina, as a clairvoyant, sees her future by reading tea leaves, Marina juggles her teenage life and is at the same time interested in her roots. Surprisingly, it is the granddaughters who, as young people, ask intensively about the stories of their ancestors and try to come to terms with the past characterized by silent niches. How juedische- Allgemeine.de describes, the novel is about the desperate attempts to find access to family history through narrative mediation.

An innovative storytelling approach

The mice, which act as an ironic parody of the omniscient narrator, are reminiscent of literary greats such as E.T.A. Hoffmann and Kafka. An interesting element is the link between individual fate and collective memory, with the granddaughters drawing on the experiences of their mother and grandmother to break the silence of the past. It is primarily the topic of anti-Semitism and national movements such as “Pamjat” that are displayed to illustrate the historical dimension of Marfutova's stories.

Using vivid and dynamic language seasoned with a pinch of humor, Marfutova conveys complex questions about identity and memory. “How do I tell a gap?” and “Who owns the story?” are central questions that are repeatedly raised by the images and scenes in the novel. The ironic refraction of the narrative is also reinforced by the mice, which accompany the events in a humorous way. Loud bpb.de This type of storytelling is not only unique, but also marks a fresh approach within Jewish literature, which is currently characterized by diversity and an eventful history.

A look into the past

Marfutova, born in Moscow in 1988 and raised in Germany, creates a bridge between different eras and topics with her novel. Historical events such as the Holodomor and the Holocaust are dealt with, the shadow of which also falls on the Jewish identity of the protagonists. Last but not least, tensions caused by anti-Semitism in the Soviet Union and the challenges of Jewish emigration are more than present today. These issues deserve to be explored, and Marfutova gives the characters a voice that desperately seeks answers.

With her first novel, “Heaven a Hundred Years Ago,” she had already drawn attention to historical questions; Her new work deepens the picture and gives the next generation the opportunity to find and tell their own story. The novel is a powerful look at the complexity of identities and the pursuit of truth, which, it seems, will continue in the next book.