Giant by Aharon Applefeld Analysis

Giant is a short story which was written by a Jewish whose name is Aharon Appelfeld. He was an Israeli novelist who was born in Czernowitz, Romania which now is Ukrainne on February 16, 1932. The author was one of many Holocaust survivors during Nazi regime. The fact influences the author in writing the story. He tended to choose Hebrew language rather than his mother’s tongue, German, not only because his school used Hebrew but also because he had a subject matter or we so call trauma because of Holocaust. As we know during the Holocaust, thousands Jews were murdered by Nazi regime. In this story titled Giant, I think, Aharon Appelfed did not directly write the story which addresses to his personal life or experience, but he tended to make the readers who read the story to interpret the meaning of the whole story in various ways and point of views. Roth (1988) had interviewed Aharon Applefeld and stated that in the age of 14, in 1946 exactly, the author of Giant was moving from Romania to Tel Aviv which is near Jerusalem, Israel. The correlation between the year of his moving and the year stated in the beginning of the story is very significance. In 1946, Aharon Applefeld was a newcomer to the town name Tel Aviv in Jerusalem, he was just like a newborn baby who had the first time to see the real world, real world condition after Holocaust, of course. Then, it is just like Giant who was just born in that exact years.

The setting of place of this story is in Haifa. It is the third largest city in Israel which is located near a hill and beach. The significance of the setting place which is taken in Haifa is that the fact that his parents were survivor in the Holocaust. In 1945s many Holocaust survivors migrated from many camps where the Holocaust done by Nazi regime to a better place that they thought safe. The setting place in Haifa also proves that the father of the Giant was a Holocaust survivor that joined the migration also. Then, according to James and Jeffrey (1981: 43) the time of day or time of year at which a given event or series of events occurs can also contribute importantly to setting as well. In addition, the intention of the author in establishing the setting time and place is to make the reader see and feel the story, then because the location which is near a beach make the Giant became a good friend with the beach, because the condition a year after World War II was still not stable and bitter for the Jews who were the Victim of the Holocaust. Thus, it made the Giant liked sea which offered him closeness, silence, and repose.

His family background which shaped him become a strong, sturdy, and talk less. Both of his parents were tall and brawny, but they never caught up each other. The fact that they were living and surviving during the Holocaust conducted by Nazi regime. During the Holocaust, many Jews were sent into an extermination camp which is different with the concentration camp. Mostly, the concentration camps were located in German and some of them were deemed to be slave. In this case, his father became a slave worker in Auschwitz may because of his big body was fit with this kind of job. Auschwitz is an extermination camp built by Nazi to do mass killing. Unlike in the concentration camp in other place, camp in Auschwitz distinguished people who fit to work for exhaustion in order to produce the war logistic and who directly would be sent into gas chamber to be murdered by Nazi and its collaborators. The mother of him survived because she was hidden by a peasant during a war. She was strong and not easy to intimidate although his father revoke her every day in her entire life because she had been ever hidden by a peasant. Both of them seem like the real images of the Nazi and survivors. The father of him was survive in the Auschwitz and he became a slave worker that made him become very rough. On the other hand, his mother who never underwent the Holocaust because she was hidden by a peasant, so this fact shaped her become strong but silent. In this case, the author likes have intention to have a description between the cruelty of Nazi and the victim.

 https://commons.wikimedia.org
Camp Auschwitz

The story was narrated by first-person point of view. Besides the clear signal that this story uses the ‘I’. In addition, the I here as the first point of view retains the inside position, but goes one steps further by locating the point of view in a character who addresses the reader directly without an intermediary (James & Jeffrey,1981: 50). It is clearly significance that the first person of view or the Giant in this story directly knows the thought and feelings that reveal which are his own feeling.

In order to emphasize the detail of the story, the author used some of figurative language. First figurative language that used is personification, “The sea, my good and faithful friend, watched me over me,..” it seems that the sea has interactions with him. In my opinion, the usage of putting personification here is to give detail that the Giant was very close with the sea in term of emotion since in the beginning of the story it is stated that he used to go to the beach. The second figurative language is hyperbole. The function of this kind figurative language is to exaggerate the situation. The example of hyperbole is when the Giant describes how his father get furious towards his mother, “with an astonishing torrent of words.” The next example is when the Giant describes Mina who is quite and almost never said any word, “Every word she utters costs her blood.” The other figurative language used in this story is the metaphor which in this story stated, “They were bastioned,” it describes the physical appearance of the parents of him. The simile is also used in this story also, “The trucks seemed like my parents my parents to me: mute and dangerous,” it gives detail the reason why the Giant did not like them because they were like his parents who were sturdy and strong, but silent. The irony is stated when the Giant whose body size was bigger and unlike any other people had very small courage to tell, speak, reveal what he felt, or even to stand with a pressure. For example, he said, “I can’t stand with the pressure of the place.” The next example that can be looked at is when he did not have any bravery and idea what and how to express hid feeling for Mina.

The first issue which comes out from this story is a cultural issue. The parents of the Giant never let him to sell any inheritance, because selling it just will make the seller or the descents become poor. In the story it is stated by the saying of his father, “Whoever sells an inheritance will stand naked and bereft one day.” In Javanese culture, the people who break any dying exhortation will not have a good life after all. The inheritance itself is the symbol of responsibility, pursuance, and love. The heir should be responsible to always keep what the giver has given for any better. Then, it is the obligation of the heir in order to respect and obey the dying exhortation of the giver. From the parents point of view, inheritance is kind of symbol that they love their children by leaving them something useful to make their heir survive for the rest of life. In addition, in this case, the parents of the Giant did want him could survive by keeping the inheritance by himself. On the contrary, in fact, the Giant could not stand to keep the inheritance any longer. He always thought that he must had have a different path and way of life from what his father and mother had had. It seems that the Giant was not responsible and obedient. After his father and his mother died, he did not think deeply and he directly had strong eager to sell the trucks which were his parents’ inheritance. Whereas, his father had ever warned him that inheritance was an elixir of live, but he always ignored anything about the warning. The next symbol in the story are the trucks that inherit form his father and mother. It is also the reason why the Giant hated the truck because the trucks were tall, big, and sturdy but they are silence like his parents.

In many cases, the Giant’s characteristic who he was hasty and short thinking was revealed. He did not think any further what risks he might get after selling his father inheritance and how actually he had already made his father and mother disappointed. In addition, he had unstable convictions since he always shortly thought to quit his jobs. In this case, the Giant’s characteristics also influenced by his family’s condition. His father and his mother loved them in silence, so that he could not reveal whatever he felt. His father and mother never forced him to get good marks in school, all what they want him was to continue his father’s work in order to manage the trucking company. Thus, it affects his emotion and psychological condition.

The special thing that I point out from this story is that the author did not write down any name of the figures in this story except one person in the last part of the story which is Mina. The meaning of Mina in Hebrew is peaceful and comfortable. The significance of Mina’s existence in this story is to emphasize how the Giant’s life. Unlike Mina, his life was not really comfortable and also he did not really has peaceful in his life, it can be seen that he used to try to do everything in a hectic and short thinking. He never considered deeply about the risks that he might get after doing something. The next special think that as the reader should think is about the Giant’s surrounding life and environment. The body size of Giant and his parents were different most people in common. Here is a big question actually, “Why there are two difference body size living in the same time and place?” Well, in my personal opinion, it is the result of the migration after Holocaust in around 1945-1946. In those years, many Jews came leaving the extermination and concentration camp in Poland for Palestine’s national territory where now belongs to Israel territory. There were many Jews from many different places took place in Haifa as their refugees. That’s what the reason why there were different physical appearance in term of body size comes out from the story.

If we want to know about the theme of a story, we should come to a question ‘what is the author trying to say?”. Then, theme, according to James and Jeffrey (1981: 61) is the author’s way of communicating and sharing ideas, perception, and feeling with his readers or, as is so often the case, of probing and exploring with them the puzzling questions of human existence. Therefore, this story is mainly about the guilty feeling felt by the Giant after selling his parents’ inheritance. The author of the Giant is trying to say about the Holocaust that underwent by people in the previous and shows the readers the nowadays effect. The effect that shown in the story is the psychological effect obtained by the parents of the Giant. It was a kind of traumatic matter that shapes the way his parents living. They become talk less, frightened and hate each other. In addition, it seems in the beginning of the story his parents did no show him love or affection clearly. His mother’s love for him was not really soft. The way she love the Giant is rough and she tended to make the Giant became strong to figure out life. Those affect a family child developmental psychology also and it affect his psychology is that the Giant is like having no any grip to hold onto. The psychological effect that the Giant had is that he become talk less like both of his parents. Therefore, the mainly theme of this story is silence and muteness.

The moral value of the story that we can learn are many. The first that can be seen by seeing at glance to the title ‘Giant’ is it my lead the reader that the story is about a strong and cruel creature. Like on the Longman Advanced American Dictionary, giant means a very tall strong man who is often bad and cruel. On the contrary, the story does not run like that, but it is a kind of contradictory that the Giant is strong but not cruel. Even, he did not have any idea to hurt other people although he had the strength to do. That is why it teaches us not to judge the book by its cover. The next lesson that we can obtain that it is true that parent’s love for their children never ends even they were in the underworld. They might never show a clear and attractive affection or even they love their children in silence. Parents still parents who loves their children through their own ways.

References:

§  Anonymous. (-) Aharon Appelfed. Retrieved from http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/biography/appelfeld.html

§  Anonymous. (-). Jewish name. www.kveller.com/jewish _names/dispaly.php?n+Minna&k=1060

§  Longman Academic e-tutor. 2012. Longman Advanced erican Dictionary. Pearson: Longman.

§  Pickering, James H. & Hoeper, Jeffret D. 1981. Concise Companion to Literature. New York: Macmillan Publishing.

§  Roth, Philip. 1988. http://www.nytimes.com/books/98/02/15/home/appelfeld-roth.html (online). Accessed on December 17, 2014.