Raphael, Freferic "The Siren's Song"

A rumination on guilt and responsibility (both personal and, more broadly, national) which looks at the life of a Greek shipping tycoon (possibly modeled after Aristotle Onassis) who had allowed a ramshackle freighter carrying Jews fleeing the Nazis to sink in the Black Sea. Raphael’s protagonist is Iakobos, 1st Mate of the BRODA, which, as the story opens, has arrived in Istanbul in early 1942 from the Danube delta with hundreds of “Jews; pilgrims who can neither move forward or back.” Denied visas to Palestine by British authorities and not allowed to land in Turkey, the ship sets sail back into the Black Sea. Both her captain (Rubik, “an Albanian Epirot”) and mate know that the ship is thoroughly unseaworthy (her seaworthiness certificate and other documents had been purchased), and in due course “when the ship is torpedoed, or hits wreckage, it splits soggily like a paper bag full of water,” sinks like a stone with only the captain and Iakobos escaping death. The sinking is at the heart of Raphael’s story, which then goes on to trace Iakobos’ rise to prominence (he marries a rich shipowner’s daughter) from 1946 onwards. Despite late life philanthropy (he secretly funds the rebuilding of Thesaaloniki’s synagogue after the War), Iakobos can never forget his part in the BRODA incident. Raphael’s tale has an ironic ending, with Iakobos himself drowning in 1986 (he is pushed off the deck of his luxury yacht into the Ionic Sea by old Capt. Rubik, a man consumed with envy for Iakobos’ riches; double irony – Rubik himself then slips on deck, falls overboard and drowns having never felt guilt for his part in the BRODA’s sinking).