1. It is terrible how much has been
forgotten, which is why, I suppose, remembering seems a holy thing.
This quote is from the prologue, and
it occurs after Dinah recounts how her life has been distilled down
to a few lines in the Bible over time. She laments that the “chain
connecting mother to daughter was broken,” naming this chain as
the reason that her true story, which is a love story, fell by the
wayside. At the time when Dinah lived, only men’s histories were
committed to paper, and women’s stories were transmitted orally
from mother to daughter across generations. Her story would have
been important only to her daughters. Since she did not have daughters,
Dinah’s story has faded from memory but for a few gruesome details.
Dinah comments indirectly on the mistaken descriptions of her story
and her mothers’ stories in the Bible, proclaiming that her telling
will truthfully amend the record. As a result, the memory of the
women of her family will no longer be distorted and half-forgotten.
Dinah introduces herself as both the narrator and the
protagonist of the novel in the prologue. By telling her story in
the form of “remembering,” as if from the distant past, she creates
valuable psychological distance between herself as the narrator
and her traumatic personal history. Dinah’s detached narration gives
the story the feeling of a legend—a story that should be heard,
remembered, and then recounted over and over again through generations.
In the prologue, Dinah also alludes to a promise she made to her
mothers to keep their stories alive. She says that they held her
face between their hands and made her swear to remember their secrets
and stories. In telling her story, Dinah fulfills an oath to her
mothers to remember and honor them.
