The Color of Water

by

James McBride

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Ruth’s father, whose full name is Fishel Shilsky. He was born in Russia but crossed the border to Poland to marry Mameh before immigrating to the United States. He was an Orthodox rabbi and a shopkeeper, but more than anything he was a cruel, greedy man. Tateh molested Ruth and verbally abused her siblings and his wife. He cared more about his own wealth and wellbeing than anyone else’s, and seemed to value his family because of the free labor they provided. He was also a racist, and although he sold goods to the black community in Suffolk he despised his black customers, and disowned Ruth for marrying a black man.

Tateh / Fishel Shilsky Quotes in The Color of Water

The The Color of Water quotes below are all either spoken by Tateh / Fishel Shilsky or refer to Tateh / Fishel Shilsky. For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
Race and Racism Theme Icon
).
Chapter 21 Quotes

“I know you’re gonna marry a shvartse. You’re making a mistake.” That stopped me cold, because I didn’t know how he learned it. To this day I don’t know. He said, “If you marry a nigger, don’t ever come home again. Don’t come back.”
“I’ll always come to see Mameh.”
“Not if you marry a nigger you won’t,” he said. “Don’t come back.”

Related Characters: Ruth McBride-Jordan (speaker), Tateh / Fishel Shilsky (speaker), Andrew Dennis McBride Sr. , Mameh / Hudis Shilsky
Page Number: 215
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 22 Quotes

Like most of the Jews in Suffolk they treated me very kindly, truly warm and welcoming, as if I were one of them, which in an odd way I suppose I was. I found it odd and amazing when white people treated me that way, as if there were no barriers between us. It said a lot about this religion—Judaism—that some of its followers, old southern crackers who talked with southern twangs and wore straw hats, seemed to believe that its covenants went beyond the color of one’s skin. The Sheffers, Helen Weintraub, the Jaffes, they talked to me in person and by letter in a manner and tone that, in essence, said “Don’t forget us. We have survived her. Your mother was part of this…”

Related Characters: James McBride (speaker), Ruth McBride-Jordan , Tateh / Fishel Shilsky, The Sheffer Family, The Jaffe Family, Helen Weintraub
Page Number: 224
Explanation and Analysis:

As I walked along the wharf and looked over the Nansemond River, which was colored an odd purple by the light of the moon, I said to myself, “What am I doing here? This place is so lonely. I gotta get out of here.” It suddenly occurred to me that my grandmother had walked around here and gazed upon this water many times, and the loneliness and agony that Hudis Shilsky felt as a Jew in this lonely southern town—far from her mother and sisters in New York, unable to speak English, a disabled Polish immigrant whose husband had no love for her and whose dreams of seeing her children grow up in America vanished as her life drained out of her at the age of forty-six—suddenly rose up in my blood and washed over me in waves. A penetrating loneliness covered me, lay on me so heavily I had to sit down and cover my face. I had no tears to shed. They were done long ago, but a new pain and a new awareness were born inside me. The uncertainty that lived inside me began to dissipate; the ache that the little boy who stared in the mirror felt was gone. My own humanity was awakened, rising up to greet me with a handshake as I watched the first glimmers of sunlight peek over the horizon.

Related Characters: James McBride (speaker), Mameh / Hudis Shilsky, Tateh / Fishel Shilsky
Page Number: 228
Explanation and Analysis:
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Tateh / Fishel Shilsky Quotes in The Color of Water

The The Color of Water quotes below are all either spoken by Tateh / Fishel Shilsky or refer to Tateh / Fishel Shilsky. For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
Race and Racism Theme Icon
).
Chapter 21 Quotes

“I know you’re gonna marry a shvartse. You’re making a mistake.” That stopped me cold, because I didn’t know how he learned it. To this day I don’t know. He said, “If you marry a nigger, don’t ever come home again. Don’t come back.”
“I’ll always come to see Mameh.”
“Not if you marry a nigger you won’t,” he said. “Don’t come back.”

Related Characters: Ruth McBride-Jordan (speaker), Tateh / Fishel Shilsky (speaker), Andrew Dennis McBride Sr. , Mameh / Hudis Shilsky
Page Number: 215
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 22 Quotes

Like most of the Jews in Suffolk they treated me very kindly, truly warm and welcoming, as if I were one of them, which in an odd way I suppose I was. I found it odd and amazing when white people treated me that way, as if there were no barriers between us. It said a lot about this religion—Judaism—that some of its followers, old southern crackers who talked with southern twangs and wore straw hats, seemed to believe that its covenants went beyond the color of one’s skin. The Sheffers, Helen Weintraub, the Jaffes, they talked to me in person and by letter in a manner and tone that, in essence, said “Don’t forget us. We have survived her. Your mother was part of this…”

Related Characters: James McBride (speaker), Ruth McBride-Jordan , Tateh / Fishel Shilsky, The Sheffer Family, The Jaffe Family, Helen Weintraub
Page Number: 224
Explanation and Analysis:

As I walked along the wharf and looked over the Nansemond River, which was colored an odd purple by the light of the moon, I said to myself, “What am I doing here? This place is so lonely. I gotta get out of here.” It suddenly occurred to me that my grandmother had walked around here and gazed upon this water many times, and the loneliness and agony that Hudis Shilsky felt as a Jew in this lonely southern town—far from her mother and sisters in New York, unable to speak English, a disabled Polish immigrant whose husband had no love for her and whose dreams of seeing her children grow up in America vanished as her life drained out of her at the age of forty-six—suddenly rose up in my blood and washed over me in waves. A penetrating loneliness covered me, lay on me so heavily I had to sit down and cover my face. I had no tears to shed. They were done long ago, but a new pain and a new awareness were born inside me. The uncertainty that lived inside me began to dissipate; the ache that the little boy who stared in the mirror felt was gone. My own humanity was awakened, rising up to greet me with a handshake as I watched the first glimmers of sunlight peek over the horizon.

Related Characters: James McBride (speaker), Mameh / Hudis Shilsky, Tateh / Fishel Shilsky
Page Number: 228
Explanation and Analysis: