The Red Tent by Anita Diamant (Fiction) Paperback 321 pages (November 1998) Picador USA ISBN: 0312195516 Bookshelf Categories Women's Spirituality

* ORDER THIS BOOK *

Synopsis:

"Diamant vividly conjures up the ancient world of caravans, farmers, midwives, slaves, and artisans . . . her Dinah is a compelling narrator that has timeless resonance".--Merle Rubin, "Christian Science Monitor".

The dazzling story of Dinah, Jacob's only daughter in the Book of Genesis, The Red Tent is a beautiful, thought-provoking novel as important to our time as The Women's Room was in the seventies.

Reviews:

Sisterhood	7/22/2001
Reviewer: Megan
I began this book with minor amounts of prejudice. I am a Christian, the book was recommended to me by a Jewish woman. I am also fiercely supportive of the rights of women. I thought that I would encounter a novel not only filled with tradition and ideas that were completely foreign to me, but also that would horrify me with stories of the mistreatment of women. I found neither. From the beginning the novel tells a beautiful story of compassion, and humanity. The mothers' stories are told with reverence and pride. And Dinah's story is told with such a beautiful voice, seeking and finding, yet allowing the reader to divine his or her own idea of Dinah. Her behavior must be imagined, as she tells the story mostly of others, and less herself. I shed many tears during the story and I wondered why. I had read darker, sadder tales before. But this struck a chord. It told a story of history, legacy, and sisterhood. It told a story of great people being human. I read the reviews that you will find below this one. I must comment about the review by Ellen of New York. I believe that the characters that we know from the Bible, Isaac and Rebecca, Jacob and Joseph were dynamic characters. They were human. For years we have seen these people as larger than life, people who lived inside of the stories of the Bible. Now in this book, they challenge you because, in the Bible they are one dimensional. I applaud Diamant for taking risks and making these people what they were-HUMAN. With a legacy to continue. From The Red Tent, I conclude what Dinah does at the end, "There is no magic to immortality". Just because traditions die and are lost, the legacy lives on, perhaps not the way we choose it to, yet it does all the same.

This book is incredible...	6/18/2001
Reviewer: Danielle Helm
This book was an incredible comfort to me, one that I wasn't even aware I needed. I am 20 years old, and am just beginning to understand what it means to be a woman here in the U.S. Reading this book made me realize what we have lost as women. Our rituals have sputtered, and figureing yourself and your roles in this world is as dificult as ever before. I cherish this book because it has told me some of what being a woman is about, something that only a woman knows deep inside, and our damaged mothers have lost the ability to help shed light upon. Books like these are what guide me along, unafraid, into womanhood. My favorite line: "The painful things- Werenro's story, Re-nefer's choice, even my own loneliness- seemed like the knots on a beautiful necklace, necessary for keeping the beads in place. My eyes filled as I bade farewell to those days, but I felt no regret."

The Red Tent	3/1/2000
Reviewer: Ellen from Irvington, New York
The ads proclaim: "What the Bible would be like if it werewritten by women." I'm not so sure about that. The Bible is the story of the triumph of monotheism, and the women characters in this book are idol-worshippers. However, such details aside, this is an engrossing novel that humanizes a "minor character" from Genesis and brings vividly to life one of the Bible's most disturbing passages: the "rape" of Dinah and the bloody killing of the men of Shechem by her brothers, Jacob's sons. Most previous midrashim (commentaries on the text) present Dinah as a brazen harlot who "asked for it" and brought disgrace upon her people. Diamant has created a warm, admirable (and very modern-thinking) Dinah. In this book it is her brothers, the fathers of the tribes of Israel, who are guilty of the disgraceful act. They were, but I wish Diamant hadn't made all of them quite so cartoonish and one-dimensional. Perhaps they had one or two redeeming characteristics. After all, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob are the ones Jews around the world invoke in their prayers every day. I applaud shedding light on the women, but couldn't that have been done without darkening the memories of the men? All in all, though, a lovely novel. And one that is apparently helping quite a few alienated Jewish women get in touch with their heritage.

If you have a daughter, read this book!	11/28/1999
Reviewer: kristina from Idaho Falls, Idaho
If you are a daughter, sister, or mother of a daughter, you need to read this book. This book about the life of Dinah, Jacob and Leah's daughter- the only daughter of Jacob's brood-- made me appreciate being a woman in all respects. I also understand the bonds of women even more than I ever have. I am excited about being a mother to my daughter and the incredible responsibility that I have. I hope that I can be as close to her as Dinah was to her "mothers". This book grabbed me in the prologue and for the few days that it took me to read this beautiful book, I slept, ate, and lived with Dinah. I cried when I finished because I missed the characters and I missed being a part of their lives. There has never been another book that touched me quite like this one. When my daughter is old enough, I will give it to her.