The first chapter of "My Name is Asher Lev," by Chaim Potok was very interesting. Asher discovered his artistic talent at age four and has been using it ever since. The narrator, Asher, remembers vividly specific details about using his gift as a child. He says he remembers holding holding his pencil and "transferring the world" onto pieces of paper and margins of books. As one grow older, they usually only remember events from their early childhood that are particullarly special to them. Drawing must be very important to Asher.
After Polok talks about Asher drawing his mother on all their outings together, he has Mrs. Lev say, "But why didn't you draw the prettybirds, Asher? And the flowers, Asher, why didn't you draw theflowers?" In a way, I think this is a foreshadowing of the mother's upcoming depression. She demonstrates here that maybe she has a low self esteem because she believes that she doesn't belong among the beautiful things. It's possible that she needs other people to help boost her confidence and maybe her Yaakov, who died, brother was especially good at that. Asher, however, did see his mother as being a beautiful person.
On the other hand, the memories that Asher draws of his father don't seem to be as fond. All the pictures that he draws of his father show him praying or performing other religious tasks. This shows us that Asher's father is a very religious man. Also, Asher's relationship with his father doesn't seem to be as close as his relationship with his mother in the earlier part of the chapter. Towards the end of thechapter, however, the reader can sense that the relationship between Asher and his father is maturing.
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