Exodus
Length of time in possession before being read : 2 or 3 days
Exodus is the story of birth of a nation. The nation of Israel as a sovereign state recognised by the UN in 20th Century History. It begins at the close of World War 2 with many post Holocaust Jews endeavouring to be repatriated to the Jewish state promised them by the international community. It is very different from Anita Diamant’s Day After Night, which focused on female refugees themselves and not just because it is a better novel.
We are introduced early in the novel to its two central protagonists. One is Kitty Fremont, a bereaved American nurse, who has some intrinsic anti-semitic prejudices and Ari Ben Canaan, a native Israeli and a hard as nails freedom fighter, part of early Mossad. Kitty joins a party of immigrants in order to remain close to an orphaned girl, slowly finding that she falls in love with Israel and the other characters we meet.
In addition to the post war narrative we also get several other narratives, the journey of Ari Ben Canaan’s forefathers; Yakov and Jossi Rabinsky, as they travel from a closed East European ghetto to Palestine, joining the small groups of Jewish settlements in the late 1800’s, as well as aspects of Ari’s own childhood.
So too, do we get the Holocaust survival stories of Karen Clement and Dov Landau, each with very different stories to tell. The final strand is the birth of a Nation, a birth of blood, grief and loss as the Arab Nations turn on the returning Jews for control of what was once Palestine beginning what is now a 70 year Middle Eastern Conflict.
I loved this book, each different strand was as compelling as the last and no section bored me. Interesting, informative, engrossing, entertaining, I had but one qualm against it:
The book, written by a Jewish author feels biased. The Arabs are described as primitive, lazy, lacking in education or motivation and are rarely described in any positive light and their political standpoint is not given any consideration let alone balanced consideration.
A thunderous hit at the time of publication, it is not very hard to see why.
Destination : Keeping this book
Verdict : 10/10
Showing posts with label Judaism. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Judaism. Show all posts
Thursday, 27 December 2012
Wednesday, 19 December 2012
Book #98 Day After Night by Anita Diamant
Day After Night
Day After Night covers a period of history not often covered by fiction. Though there are plenty of books about the Holocaust, I do not know of many which cover the decision of many Holocaust survivors to travel to Jewish homeland Israel/Zion to be repatriated. There is, I am told Exodus by Leon Uris, a monster hit in the 1950s, but I have not read it and so this book was my first brush with this period.
The novel focuses on four women Zorah, Leonie, Tedi, and Shayndel who all survived the persecution of their race in different circumstances and are all seeking a new start. Thrown together at British detention centre Atlit, tentative bonds begin to form between the broken and distrustful women.
It is so so hard not to compare this book to The Red Tent, the Diamant novel I read last month. Where the prose in that novel is lyrical and beautiful, Day and Night is far plainer and less engaging. It is hard to feel involved with the women at times, and I hate to say it but at times they bored me, which feels like a terrible thing to say given the subject matter.
There are little pockets of greatness here and there, particularly in the way in which the women's dealings with Lotte are described, and the individuality of each woman's origin, but something about it feels like more of a history lesson than a story, less character than simply archetype, like its purpose is solely informative. For this reason it is a bit colourless as a novel, yet as the fates of each character were rounded up, I did shed a tear so I was definitely moved at the end.
Unlike the Red Tent though it is not a book which lights up your mind and imagination. At best I would consider it a 5 or 6/10
Day After Night covers a period of history not often covered by fiction. Though there are plenty of books about the Holocaust, I do not know of many which cover the decision of many Holocaust survivors to travel to Jewish homeland Israel/Zion to be repatriated. There is, I am told Exodus by Leon Uris, a monster hit in the 1950s, but I have not read it and so this book was my first brush with this period.
The novel focuses on four women Zorah, Leonie, Tedi, and Shayndel who all survived the persecution of their race in different circumstances and are all seeking a new start. Thrown together at British detention centre Atlit, tentative bonds begin to form between the broken and distrustful women.
It is so so hard not to compare this book to The Red Tent, the Diamant novel I read last month. Where the prose in that novel is lyrical and beautiful, Day and Night is far plainer and less engaging. It is hard to feel involved with the women at times, and I hate to say it but at times they bored me, which feels like a terrible thing to say given the subject matter.
There are little pockets of greatness here and there, particularly in the way in which the women's dealings with Lotte are described, and the individuality of each woman's origin, but something about it feels like more of a history lesson than a story, less character than simply archetype, like its purpose is solely informative. For this reason it is a bit colourless as a novel, yet as the fates of each character were rounded up, I did shed a tear so I was definitely moved at the end.
Unlike the Red Tent though it is not a book which lights up your mind and imagination. At best I would consider it a 5 or 6/10
Sunday, 4 March 2012
Book #21 The Assistant by Bernard Malamud
The Assistant
Not to be confused with the Robert Walser novel of the same name, it appears you can only buy this novel second hand on Amazon UK now which is a great shame, it is possibly out of print, at least in this country, I bought mine second hand and it's a really good quality edition.
I had been urged to read The Assistant by a number of people a couple of years ago. Books often take time to arrive at their turn, and so it came to pass that I gave The Assistant a go.
In The Assistant, a lowly shopkeeper, Morris Bober ekes by a small living in a run down delicatessen with his wife and daughter, verging on penniless, their existence is a narrow one. Morris and his wife rarely leave their shop and living quarters, and because of their poor finances their daughter can only attend night school not college proper. Helen Bober too, has begun to narrow her own existence, embarrassed by her poverty she cuts off contact with friends and shuts down a relationship with a wealthier man.
Into the midst of this comes a sudden attack, the Bober's have apparently been targeted for a robbery the fundamental cause being anti-semitic in nature. The robbers take what they can, but Bober has little to give anyway. After becoming injured during the robbery Bober is forced to take on an Assistant, and after discovering Frank Alpine sleeping in his cellar, hires him in exchange for lodgings.
But is Frank Alpine all he seems to be??
The Assistant is very well written, and so is enjoyable from that angle, but it has a dour nature and a grimness that in the end doesn't strike the uplifting note that I was led to believe it would at least not for me personally. Frank Alpine is difficult to identify with considering his behaviour and I couldn't warm to him. Helen's existence but lack of life and youth depressed me, old before her time. That said its character portraits are very sound, detailed, rich. But would somebody really behave as Frank does?? I'm not sure.
The nature and reasoning behind anti-semitism has always confused me and continues to do so in this novel, to hate someone merely for being a Jew alone, seems not merely racism or prejudice but entirely lacking in logic. It makes me sad.
All in all, it is a good book, but I will probably pass it on and not read it a second time 7/10
Not to be confused with the Robert Walser novel of the same name, it appears you can only buy this novel second hand on Amazon UK now which is a great shame, it is possibly out of print, at least in this country, I bought mine second hand and it's a really good quality edition.
I had been urged to read The Assistant by a number of people a couple of years ago. Books often take time to arrive at their turn, and so it came to pass that I gave The Assistant a go.
In The Assistant, a lowly shopkeeper, Morris Bober ekes by a small living in a run down delicatessen with his wife and daughter, verging on penniless, their existence is a narrow one. Morris and his wife rarely leave their shop and living quarters, and because of their poor finances their daughter can only attend night school not college proper. Helen Bober too, has begun to narrow her own existence, embarrassed by her poverty she cuts off contact with friends and shuts down a relationship with a wealthier man.
Into the midst of this comes a sudden attack, the Bober's have apparently been targeted for a robbery the fundamental cause being anti-semitic in nature. The robbers take what they can, but Bober has little to give anyway. After becoming injured during the robbery Bober is forced to take on an Assistant, and after discovering Frank Alpine sleeping in his cellar, hires him in exchange for lodgings.
But is Frank Alpine all he seems to be??
The Assistant is very well written, and so is enjoyable from that angle, but it has a dour nature and a grimness that in the end doesn't strike the uplifting note that I was led to believe it would at least not for me personally. Frank Alpine is difficult to identify with considering his behaviour and I couldn't warm to him. Helen's existence but lack of life and youth depressed me, old before her time. That said its character portraits are very sound, detailed, rich. But would somebody really behave as Frank does?? I'm not sure.
The nature and reasoning behind anti-semitism has always confused me and continues to do so in this novel, to hate someone merely for being a Jew alone, seems not merely racism or prejudice but entirely lacking in logic. It makes me sad.
All in all, it is a good book, but I will probably pass it on and not read it a second time 7/10
Tuesday, 10 January 2012
Book #6 Far To Go by Alison Pick
Far To Go
Far To Go tells the story of the Bauer family, there is a connection to the true life story of the family of Alison Pick who escaped Czechoslovakia for Canada during the war. In this, it bears some similarity to Anne Michaels Fugitive Pieces which I read at the end of last year.
In Far To Go, the Jewish Bauer family find their lives both metaphorically and literally under threat as German aggression begins to absorb Czechoslovakia into its borders. Pavel Bauer who has lived a secular life does not really believe it will happen to him, but begins to identify with and explore his Jewish heritage when it comes under threat. Initially, he is unwilling to part with his precious son Pepik but as the threat of the Holocaust marches closer, he begins to consider to try placing his son on the Kindertransport, the initiative of a British man who saved the lives of many Jewish children.
Far To Go was longlisted last year for the Man Booker Prize last year but didn't make it to the shortlist and though it is not a bad book and is eminently readable, it is flawed and its potential is wasted I can see why it wasn't shortlisted.
The Kindertransport is a really different angle to take on the stories of the Second World War and would make an involving book. Unfortunately this isn't that book, the bulk of this book concerns Pepik's nanny Martha, her loyalty or in my opinion lack thereof to the Bauer family. It also covers the well trod ground of the encroaching fear and sudden oppression of Jewish communities in Nazi Occupied Europe.
Both Pepik and first cousin Tomas make it out of Europe on the Kindertransport but little to nothing is made of that experience and what that was like for children. In fact the first page of the book informs us that Tomas reached a family in the UK, he is never referred to in the novel again, and Pepik's experience is completely truncated. It just seems like a totally missed chance. Towards the end of the book it becomes all about main character Lisa's research, and how the story was pieced together as best she could from her research. In fact though the title Far To Go implies the journey and the front cover is of a child with a suitcase the novel is barely about the Kindertransport at all. And thats the disappointment. I think I would like to read a novel that is actually about that experience.
I also disliked the manner in which Martha is painted as a heroine of sorts at the end, when in point of fact she wasn't and ultimately sabotaged the safety of her beloved Pepik and Pavel.
So, yes, this novel whilst a very readable very well written book is a pretty big disappointment and though somewhat based on the Pick family experience is lacking in terms of anything new to say. It's still worth a read but if you wanted to read a novel about that era and asked me for a recommendation, I would recommend Markus Zusak's The Book Thief among others and this novel would not spring to mind instantly 7/10
Far To Go tells the story of the Bauer family, there is a connection to the true life story of the family of Alison Pick who escaped Czechoslovakia for Canada during the war. In this, it bears some similarity to Anne Michaels Fugitive Pieces which I read at the end of last year.
In Far To Go, the Jewish Bauer family find their lives both metaphorically and literally under threat as German aggression begins to absorb Czechoslovakia into its borders. Pavel Bauer who has lived a secular life does not really believe it will happen to him, but begins to identify with and explore his Jewish heritage when it comes under threat. Initially, he is unwilling to part with his precious son Pepik but as the threat of the Holocaust marches closer, he begins to consider to try placing his son on the Kindertransport, the initiative of a British man who saved the lives of many Jewish children.
Far To Go was longlisted last year for the Man Booker Prize last year but didn't make it to the shortlist and though it is not a bad book and is eminently readable, it is flawed and its potential is wasted I can see why it wasn't shortlisted.
The Kindertransport is a really different angle to take on the stories of the Second World War and would make an involving book. Unfortunately this isn't that book, the bulk of this book concerns Pepik's nanny Martha, her loyalty or in my opinion lack thereof to the Bauer family. It also covers the well trod ground of the encroaching fear and sudden oppression of Jewish communities in Nazi Occupied Europe.
Both Pepik and first cousin Tomas make it out of Europe on the Kindertransport but little to nothing is made of that experience and what that was like for children. In fact the first page of the book informs us that Tomas reached a family in the UK, he is never referred to in the novel again, and Pepik's experience is completely truncated. It just seems like a totally missed chance. Towards the end of the book it becomes all about main character Lisa's research, and how the story was pieced together as best she could from her research. In fact though the title Far To Go implies the journey and the front cover is of a child with a suitcase the novel is barely about the Kindertransport at all. And thats the disappointment. I think I would like to read a novel that is actually about that experience.
I also disliked the manner in which Martha is painted as a heroine of sorts at the end, when in point of fact she wasn't and ultimately sabotaged the safety of her beloved Pepik and Pavel.
So, yes, this novel whilst a very readable very well written book is a pretty big disappointment and though somewhat based on the Pick family experience is lacking in terms of anything new to say. It's still worth a read but if you wanted to read a novel about that era and asked me for a recommendation, I would recommend Markus Zusak's The Book Thief among others and this novel would not spring to mind instantly 7/10
Friday, 23 December 2011
Book #95 Fugitive Pieces by Anne Michaels
Fugitive Pieces
Fugitive Pieces, a novel by the poet Anne Michaels is a book of two narrators. In the first part our narrator is Jakob, who is rescued as a child by a Greek man, Athos who smuggles him into Greece, and thereby saves his life, having rescued him from the Holocaust. Jakob grows up with geologist and academic Athos as a father figure but is haunted by the memories of his dead family in particular his sister, Bella.
Our second narrator is Ben, something of a fan of the work of both Athos and later Jakob, in what is the reverse of Jakob's situation, Ben's parents survived the Holocaust and escaped to Canada where Ben grew up. But, in doing so inflicted damage upon Ben's childhood, different to that of Jakob but from the same root.
As a novel I had a mixed response to it, it is often written in non sequiturs (pieces from a fugitive) which could often be annoying or confusing. Indeed, when the novel switched narrators from Jakob to Ben it took me ages to realise this had happened, and, this apparent change in Jakob's circumstance completely threw me off. In addition, the Jakob sections are more enjoyable and better written, though I occasionally found the novel as a whole verbose and disengaging.
Without wishing to seem offensive or lacking in compassion, I do believe that World War 2 and the Holocaust have been over ploughed as a literary location. We should never, ever, forget, but it should not become a source of cliched entertainment either. So many wonderful novels and memoirs exist on this topic, I think particularly of the beautiful and heartwrenching Night by Elie Wiesel, cannot our authors find new tales to tell in other uncovered parts of human history? Perhaps this remark is controversial but it was not meant in an offensive sense.
Despite my misgivings this novel has some very poetic prose which I enjoyed :
Fugitive Pieces, a novel by the poet Anne Michaels is a book of two narrators. In the first part our narrator is Jakob, who is rescued as a child by a Greek man, Athos who smuggles him into Greece, and thereby saves his life, having rescued him from the Holocaust. Jakob grows up with geologist and academic Athos as a father figure but is haunted by the memories of his dead family in particular his sister, Bella.
Our second narrator is Ben, something of a fan of the work of both Athos and later Jakob, in what is the reverse of Jakob's situation, Ben's parents survived the Holocaust and escaped to Canada where Ben grew up. But, in doing so inflicted damage upon Ben's childhood, different to that of Jakob but from the same root.
As a novel I had a mixed response to it, it is often written in non sequiturs (pieces from a fugitive) which could often be annoying or confusing. Indeed, when the novel switched narrators from Jakob to Ben it took me ages to realise this had happened, and, this apparent change in Jakob's circumstance completely threw me off. In addition, the Jakob sections are more enjoyable and better written, though I occasionally found the novel as a whole verbose and disengaging.
Without wishing to seem offensive or lacking in compassion, I do believe that World War 2 and the Holocaust have been over ploughed as a literary location. We should never, ever, forget, but it should not become a source of cliched entertainment either. So many wonderful novels and memoirs exist on this topic, I think particularly of the beautiful and heartwrenching Night by Elie Wiesel, cannot our authors find new tales to tell in other uncovered parts of human history? Perhaps this remark is controversial but it was not meant in an offensive sense.
Despite my misgivings this novel has some very poetic prose which I enjoyed :
And I really enjoyed a moral lesson posed by a rabbi midway through the novel that is perhaps too long to quote. Yes, ultimately I found the book mixed and I doubt I would either recommend it or re-read it 6.5/10Her mind is a palace. She moves through history with the fluency of a spirit, mourns the burning of the library at Alexandria as if it happened yesterday.
Wednesday, 23 March 2011
Book # 3 The Finkler Question by Howard Jacobson
The Finkler Question
As an avid reader its almost obligatory to make sure you read the latest Booker Prize winner. In the past I have struggled with their choices. I never "got into" Life Of Pi, or The God Of Small Things or Vernon God Little but last year Wolf Hall by Hilary Mantel blew me away. I absolutely loved it from start to finish and its storyline dovetailed in nicely to my love/hate relationship with Phillipa Gregory's royal dynasty novels, the quantity of which is plenty, the quality of which goes up and down.
Prior to reading The Finkler Question I had already read Room by Emma Donoghue one of the losing novels, and was divided in my opinion of it, whilst it was a compelling read, a true "page-turner", I had a constant nagging question in my mind about whether it wasn't slightly exploitative of the true life stories of the Fritzl family & of Natascha Kampusch from whose experience the genesis of the idea of the novel clearly comes. So, for me, Room wasn't a winner, would I agree with their choice of the Jacobson?
Julian Treslove is the novels hero or rather anti-hero, having led rather a mediocre life in which he has been successful neither professionally or in his personal life, being able to woo women but not being able to sustain a relationship.
He regularly meets and dines with his old school friend Sam Finkler and their former teacher Libor when one night he is mugged after leaving Libor's house. His attacker is a woman, something which later causes his sons much mirth, but during the attack he first thinks she knows him as she seems to use his name, but then he realises she has called him a Jew.
The attack serves to send Julian on something of a quest, could he be Jewish? Did the woman recognise something elemental in him?
Both Libor and Finkler are Jewish, and in his mind Julian has always felt something of an outsider feeling unable by his lack of Jewishness to contribute to conversations which relate to Jewish history or more modern issues facing Israel etc .
Finkler a Jewish man uncomfortable with his identity to the extent that he labels himself an Ashamed Jew, comes to represent all Jews for Treslove thus The Jewish Question becomes "The Finkler Question" & Jews become "Finklers"
This is supposed to be a comic novel thats how its billed, but personally I find a lot of pathos in it particularly for Julian, a man who has grown up in his friend Finkler's shadow, and is searching for an identity of his own.
He begins a relationship with Hephzibah, a Jewish woman which at first seems a positive step. It is here in a conversation between Finkler & Hephzibah that I find myself being able to identify personally with the novel. I've tried to relocate it in the book and i can't. Essentially, Hephzibah says something about the impact of being Jewish on her identity and outlook, and raised Catholic I found myself entirely agreeing with the essence of her experience and point by substituting the word Jew for Catholic, and what is like to be a Catholic.
Julian Treslove spends the novel going about pointing out how "Finklers" are other than him and how he will never get it right with them. The message that I took from the book, is that it is Julian himself who is other and different and not the community with which he becomes obsessed.
Is it funny? Not to me no. Is it strange? Yes! Is it worth reading? Maybe, but I will be in no rush to recommend it, having read so much there are books which always spring to mind when someone asks for a recommendation & I doubt The Finkler Question will ever be among them. Is it worthy of the Booker? I don't know, I haven't read C, The Long Song or that other one yet! 6 or 7/10
As an avid reader its almost obligatory to make sure you read the latest Booker Prize winner. In the past I have struggled with their choices. I never "got into" Life Of Pi, or The God Of Small Things or Vernon God Little but last year Wolf Hall by Hilary Mantel blew me away. I absolutely loved it from start to finish and its storyline dovetailed in nicely to my love/hate relationship with Phillipa Gregory's royal dynasty novels, the quantity of which is plenty, the quality of which goes up and down.
Prior to reading The Finkler Question I had already read Room by Emma Donoghue one of the losing novels, and was divided in my opinion of it, whilst it was a compelling read, a true "page-turner", I had a constant nagging question in my mind about whether it wasn't slightly exploitative of the true life stories of the Fritzl family & of Natascha Kampusch from whose experience the genesis of the idea of the novel clearly comes. So, for me, Room wasn't a winner, would I agree with their choice of the Jacobson?
Julian Treslove is the novels hero or rather anti-hero, having led rather a mediocre life in which he has been successful neither professionally or in his personal life, being able to woo women but not being able to sustain a relationship.
He regularly meets and dines with his old school friend Sam Finkler and their former teacher Libor when one night he is mugged after leaving Libor's house. His attacker is a woman, something which later causes his sons much mirth, but during the attack he first thinks she knows him as she seems to use his name, but then he realises she has called him a Jew.
The attack serves to send Julian on something of a quest, could he be Jewish? Did the woman recognise something elemental in him?
Both Libor and Finkler are Jewish, and in his mind Julian has always felt something of an outsider feeling unable by his lack of Jewishness to contribute to conversations which relate to Jewish history or more modern issues facing Israel etc .
Finkler a Jewish man uncomfortable with his identity to the extent that he labels himself an Ashamed Jew, comes to represent all Jews for Treslove thus The Jewish Question becomes "The Finkler Question" & Jews become "Finklers"
This is supposed to be a comic novel thats how its billed, but personally I find a lot of pathos in it particularly for Julian, a man who has grown up in his friend Finkler's shadow, and is searching for an identity of his own.
He begins a relationship with Hephzibah, a Jewish woman which at first seems a positive step. It is here in a conversation between Finkler & Hephzibah that I find myself being able to identify personally with the novel. I've tried to relocate it in the book and i can't. Essentially, Hephzibah says something about the impact of being Jewish on her identity and outlook, and raised Catholic I found myself entirely agreeing with the essence of her experience and point by substituting the word Jew for Catholic, and what is like to be a Catholic.
Julian Treslove spends the novel going about pointing out how "Finklers" are other than him and how he will never get it right with them. The message that I took from the book, is that it is Julian himself who is other and different and not the community with which he becomes obsessed.
Is it funny? Not to me no. Is it strange? Yes! Is it worth reading? Maybe, but I will be in no rush to recommend it, having read so much there are books which always spring to mind when someone asks for a recommendation & I doubt The Finkler Question will ever be among them. Is it worthy of the Booker? I don't know, I haven't read C, The Long Song or that other one yet! 6 or 7/10
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)