The Secret Chord

This first section of the book introduces the core themes, uses foreshadowing to build mood, and sets up the frame narrative, in which Natan learns the story of David’s life through interviews with those closest to him. As both a prophet and a writer, Natan is a highly introspective and thoughtful narrator, and his musings serve to introduce and contextualize the themes, beginning with The Hidden Complexity of Character. Natan ponders David’s contradictory characteristics in the Prologue, noting both his violence and love. In proposing the project of writing David’s life, he describes how hard it is to capture a person’s character in words. Natan introduces the book’s second major theme, Necessity as a Justification for Violence, when he asks whether the peaceful scenes of the Prologue could have happened without David’s bloodshed. David justifies his murder of Natan’s father by saying it was “necessary,” and this word marks the places where Natan returns to this theme throughout the narrative. Because this justification is first used in reference to an act of violence whose consequences are deeply personal for Natan, the question of whether necessity can truly justify violence becomes embedded in the prophet’s life. The third theme, The Patriarchal Abuse of Power, is only presented indirectly in these early pages. Avigail talks about her uneasy relationship with her husband. Natan’s mother is quick to advise bowing to David’s power regardless of whether it is right or wrong, while her husband is unused to the idea of submitting to wrongful power. Although David’s rape of Batsheva only appears through deliberately vague foreshadowing, his insecure masculinity is repeatedly revealed. He frames his disdain for the biographical project in terms of gender: It would be “picking at the skein of my deeds like a woman at her weaving basket. He wants to give me occupation while he usurps my place and marches my men to war” (12). Geraldine Brooks has David contrast being turned into a “woman” with Yoav fighting with “men.” The choice of the word “usurps” implies that these gendered actions are intimately connected with the right to wield power.

Foreshadowing is an apropos literary technique for a narrator who is also a prophet. Like Natan, the reader glimpses what will happen in the future but is unable to change it. Brooks carefully avoids being too specific, so the reader knows only that tragic events are in motion. Natan laments not having seen “what a proud and vital man who feared his manhood waning” (17) might do, creating a question in the reader’s mind that he does not immediately answer. This technique creates an element of anticipation, curiosity, and foreboding—one that matches Natan’s own as he watches events unfold, often knowing that the powerful people around him are making mistakes but powerless to stop them or predict their consequences.

The first half of the book functions as a frame narrative, with Natan conducting interviews to learn about David’s life and character. Brooks began her career as a journalist, and the methods Natan uses to compile the material that will make David’s biography mirror those of modern journalistic reporting. Natan spends the days leading up to Batsheva’s rape and Uriah’s murder collecting stories. Many chapters take the form of embedded narratives told by other characters or of Natan’s own flashbacks. This allows Brooks to begin the story in media res (in the midst of things) while still telling of David’s origins. More importantly, it allows her to present the reader with multiple, contrasting views of David—an essential strategy in her exploration of a complex character.