Books
by Isaac Bashevis Singer
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Enemies |
. . . and here he is in New York among disoriented holocaust survivors. Herman finds himself leading a double, no, triple, life, with three wives and a fake job, and his struggles to cover his tracks are very funny. But the underlying anguish of cultural displacement and loss of identity are not funny at all. Here again, though, powerful emotion rules behaviour - specifically Singer or a particular way of being Jewish? I'd love to know . . .
(Annabel Bedini - bwl 45 April 2008) |
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The Family Moskat |
Revisiting again . . . Warsaw from the beginning of the century up to 1939, a vast extended Jewish family and what they get up to before the dreadful end we know awaits them. Originally written in Yiddish, this rich saga is a wonderful excursion into another world - the complex characters, worldly embroilments coupled with religious agonisings, multiple divorces and re-marriages and above all the sense of life as a hurly-burly of passionate impulses. What a writer!
(Annabel Bedini - bwl 45 April 2008) |
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