A few days ago
Anonymous

advice? any constructive criticism?

Mrs. Schachter is comparable to Cassandra, the figure in Greek mythology because, like Cassandra, Mrs. Schachter can foretell the future. After Mrs. Schachter was mistakenly separated from her husband and two eldest sons, she became hysterical. One night, Mrs. Schachter repetitively starts shouting fire! People stare out the window looking for this “fire” but only darkness is seen. Similar to Cassandra’s curse, no one believed Mrs. Schachter. Everyone assumed she has gone crazy from being away from her family, but in reality she was seeing flames from the furnaces in the concentration camps. Just hours later when they had reached their destination, flames were seen shooting out of a tall chimney. Everyone including Mrs. Schachter was silent.

Top 1 Answers
A few days ago
Heather

Favorite Answer

It’s a very interesting concept. I’d flesh it out. Add narrative, dialogue, characterization, and more description. Make sure that your time period meshes with the location of where Mrs. Schachter lives and which concentration camp she and her neighbors were shipped to. Not every camp had furnaces, and some of the camps weren’t operational until the very last years of the war.

Do some research about the types of Holocaust fiction and different narratives that are out there.

I’d suggest reading “Alicia-My Story” by Alicia Appleman Jurman, “Night” by Eli Wiesel, the fictional account called “Briar Rose” by Jane Yolan, and “Eyewitness Auschwitz” by Filip Muller (although this one is an especially hard read.)

I really like the comparison to Cassandra, although it’s kind of an obscure reference that many people won’t get. You might consider incorporating a “retelling” of the myth somewhere in your story so your reader can draw fresh parallels between the two characters.

Keep working on it. I think you are on to something!

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