https://imagejournal.org/article/saras-blessings/
The book I’m writing now, about a family going through leukemia, began with an image: a woman cannot sleep because she hears something like a baby’s cry in the grind of her air conditioner. I named the woman Sara without an h, with the less familiar spelling, and as I explored her insomnia, she brought along two teenaged daughters, Izzy and Natalia.
Since then, I’ve become more aware of the names Sarah and Sara. A quick review of my contacts show five Sarahs in my phone and two more in my email, one of whom is the author of Sarah’s Blessings, and my mentor. All of them exude maternal energy and some of them have children of their own. I’ve heard each of their laughs, rueful, joyful, hopeful, astonished.
Sometimes I forget how literary these stories are. If you’re like me, looking for a new way in to the Hebrew Bible, I urge you to read Robert Alter’s generously annotated translation. It’s such an important modern work of translation. Reviewed in Tablet here and in NYT Magazine here.