Book review of \”The End of The Jews\”, a literary family saga built around three narratives in different time frames, opening with Tristan Brodsky, \”15 years old, the sum total of five thousand years of Jewry, one week into City College, a mind on him like a diamond cutter.\”
Some people cap a career by writing a memoir or an exhaustive magnum opus based on a lifetime of research. But after eight books and 30 years at the Jewish Theological Seminary in New York as rabbi and professor, Burton L. Visotzky decided to write a novel. A work of Jewish historical fiction, to be more precise.
Our summers have markers, memories that trigger a specific time: The summer of the walk on the moon, Hurricane Bob or the Democratic National Convention in Los Angeles; personal events like a high school prom, a kitchen renovation or a houseguest who long overstays.
Somehow, this most blatant form of self-promotion, this venue that, until a couple of hours ago, had looked to me like a literary meat market, has suddenly reminded me of the reason I started writing in the first place: to tell a good story; a story about Jews; a story that in its own small way continues the tale of this people who have had to struggle, in every generation, to ensure that their story doesn\’t end.
One of the best American short story writers, Apple has just published \”The Jew of Home Depot and Other Stories\” (Johns Hopkins Press), his first collection of stories in 20 years. He writes with the same playful imagination and comic intelligence as in his earlier stories, layered with irony and an infallible sense of detail.
\”Absurdistan\” (Random House, $24.95), Gary Shteyngart\’s extraordinary new novel, takes us on a no-holds-barred journey from post-communist Russia to a mythical former Soviet Union state he calls Absurdistan, with stop-offs in between to his beloved New York City. Q & A session.
An enjoyable chick-lit book, \”The Devil Wears Prada,\” in movie form follows the novel\’s storyline, with slight modifications to the plot that only enhance our understanding of Andy\’s dilemma. And for the fashion buff, the insider\’s view of the inner workings of a haute couture, albeit fictional, fashion magazine are amusing.
Published plays — especially those in anthologies — tend to be dismissed by the casual browser as specialty items, of interest only to students of theater history or to actors in search of audition material. Ellen Schiff and Michael Posnick clearly had something else in mind when they compiled their lively new collection, \”Nine Contemporary Jewish Plays.\”
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