Bernheimer has a master's degree in creative writing and edited Mirror, Mirror on the Wall: Women Writers Explore Their Favorite Fairy Tales (Anchor/Doubleday 1998). In the following essay, she discusses symbolism in "My First Goose."

When the disconsolate narrator kills a goose in Babel's story "My First Goose," he is not merely getting himself a nice supper. It is true that the narrator is miserably hungry, and that the Cossacks have denied him a share of their food. And the goose, waddling about innocently, makes an easy enough meal. Nonetheless, this goose serves several other functions in the story. Significantly, the goose is the story's very first image, found at the very beginning—in the title. Even in the title, the image of the goose is symbolic and exceeds the boundaries of Babel's plot. It is only the first goose; there will be others after the...