Dana Shem-Ur studied phi­los­o­phy at the École Nor­male Supérieure. Ph.D. can­di­date in his­to­ry at Tel Aviv Uni­ver­si­ty, she trans­lates from French, Ital­ian, Chi­nese into Hebrew and published Where I am (New Vessel Press, 2023). and Roaming Scent (Yediot Sfarim, 2026).

Introduction: “A young Israeli woman travels to Paris to study sociology. In the process, she investigates herself—her desires, her longings. A relationship that develops with an older, married lecturer becomes a grammar of absence. The novel’s turbulent opening—a hotel room in Stockholm, a single bed—points to its true subject: not the act itself but the consciousness of the act; not possession but the twilight zone in which it exists in imagination, in memory.

Phantom Scent offers rare prose in its clarity and sensual intelligence. It is a philosophical novel that breathes—or a sensual novel that thinks. It interprets eros without dimming its radiance, tracing the lingering fragrance it leaves behind. By the end, the reader is left with a sensation that does not leave the body—something few books manage to achieve.”—Benjamin Balint

Dana Shem-Ur is a writer and translator from Chinese and French. Her first book, Where I Am, was published by Pardes and by the American publisher New Vessel Press.

“Phantom Scent is a playful, intelligent, and sexy book that performs wonders with language. At the same time, it is a heartrending book about the frustrating, agonizing gaps between infatuation and love, and between physical pleasure—sublime as it may be—and emotional fulfillment.” —Yigal Schwartz 

Your novel foregrounds consciousness over action. Is fiction, for you, a form of phenomenological inquiry?

DSU: You could say that, or perhaps say that it is an inquiry into the human soul. But there, too, there is action. I do not believe, in fact, in the division between action and consciousness when it comes to writing, or to life, as the two are inherently connected.

Action is found in every mind. Desires and suppressed desires, memories, strivings, and all kinds of emotions inhabit the characters’ psyche. That is where the drama takes place for me: in the tectonic shifts within. What happens to a character in “real life” is only an extension of that drama, of that movement that begins inside.

In this sense, I often think of To the Lighthouse by Virginia Woolf, a novel I deeply love. There, on the surface, there is a quiet and peaceful life. Yet the true interest lies in the protagonist’s inner world. Similarly, in my novel Roaming Scent, I delve into the protagonist’s inner voice, into the way she experiences her craving for her lover and for love in general. I wished to understand how she feels her lover’s absence in daily life, in those quiet hours where supposedly nothing takes place, yet where the real action is found: in the shaping of her soul. 

How do you distinguish existential solitude from simple loneliness?

DSU: An interesting question. There are many ways to answer it. What comes to mind now is, again, the matter of consciousness.

Whereas loneliness can last for a fleeting moment and be experienced as an undercurrent, existential solitude, I would say, is a more permanent awareness that a person gradually acquires over time. It is not necessarily a negative feeling, as loneliness often is, but rather a mature understanding one has of life and the world, the understanding that all beings are ultimately independent from one another, and that one’s existence is inherently singular.

It is the awareness that every experience one undergoes, including death, is ultimately grasped and lived through alone.

Albert Camus’ The Myth of Sisyphus offers fascinating insights into this point.

Does estrangement — beginning the story abroad — function as a philosophical stance?

DSU: When I write, I am not consciously aware of philosophical stances or notions. I write the words as they come to the surface.

That being said, estrangement carries a central role in my writing. My choice to situate both of my novels abroad is, without a doubt, connected to my own personal experience of living away from that vague word called home, and perhaps to my desire to grasp its meaning, to question whether it truly exists.

What role does silence play: reflection, resistance, or something else?

DSU: Silence is the place where meaning emerges in its strongest and most truthful form, I believe.

The emotions, hopes, and inner conflicts that the characters encounter cannot always be spoken aloud, nor can they always be written explicitly, since words may diminish their complexity and force. Often, the characters themselves are not fully aware of what is taking place within them.

The quiet space is therefore necessary in writing that wishes to seize the depths of the soul, which exceed words.

In this sense, I was influenced by Chinese and Japanese notions of quiet. Both cultures, as well as other Asian cultures, place great value on silence in artistic expression. In Chinese aesthetics, this notion is called liubai — white space. In a painting of a dim mountain landscape, the depth of reality is often conveyed through the untouched white spaces. The eye completes the movement of birds in the void, just as the reader produces the meaning that is only partially expressed in a story.

Lastly, I would say that while writing my book, which is in large part sentimental, I found silence to be an essential tool for conveying emotion. To simply write that a character is sad or happy reduces these feelings to hollow words that may sound banal. What is happiness? What is sadness? What is anger?

When trying to express these feelings, I often felt more like a painter, striving to sketch them between the words, to make them appear in the void.

Are you intentionally challenging fixed categories such as love, shame, and desire?

DSU: No. I have often heard authors say that they wrote a certain book because they wished to explore a particular topic or convey a certain idea to the public. Personally, I never fully understood that approach.

For me, writing is not a practice undertaken with the intention of demonstrating or changing something. That would be more of an intellectual endeavor, which, in my opinion, does not belong to fiction.

When I write, I want to tell a story because there are things I wish to understand, without always being fully aware of what they are. Love and desire are certainly a central part of this. I am less sure about shame. But if these notions emerge in a new form through my writing, that is not something I consciously determine.

Do you aim to blur the divide between intellect and the body in your writing?

DSU: If so, i’m not aware of it when i’m writing. That being said, some of my readers have described my writing as both sensual and philosophical, carrying a rational tone. Perhaps I am compelled to seize the body, desire, and the senses in an intellectual register — a little like a doctor observing a phenomenon and trying to give it a name.

I find the realm of the senses fascinating precisely because it is so multidimensional, elusive, and mysterious.

How can one speak of the senses — of love, or lust — without falling into the traps of banality and superficial expression?

My desire to speak about it lies partly in that intellectual challenge.

© The Times of Israel (Blogs)