Monday, June 24, 2013

Kafka's Hasidic Sidekick

 JiriLangerIn 1894, boys like Jiří Langer were a dime a dozen: Born into an assimilated Jewish family in Prague, there was nothing notable about him until, at 19, he bought "a railway ticket to a little place in eastern Galicia," where he met the Hasidic rebbe of the town of Belz. He returned to Prague wearing traditional dress and observing Hasidic customs.

This was in an era when being a baal teshuva was unheard of. Years later, in the introduction to Nine Gates, Jiří’s collection of Hasidic tales, his brother František reflected: "Jiří resembled Kafka’s novel The Metamorphosis, in which a family finds its way of life completely upset when the son is suddenly changed into an enormous cockroach."

The allusion was not to a distant literary figure but to a real person in the young man's life. Though his parents tried to talk Jiří out of his new religiosity, the famous surrealist author took an interest in just that. Jiří, who was anything but a "normal" Hasid, started studying Jewish mysticism with Kafka, and circulating among Prague's avant-garde artists. He even published several books, including a volume of poetry called The Eroticism of Kabbalah. Probably not who you'd have expected to find in Kafka's inner circle.

- Matthue Roth

Monday, June 17, 2013

Lower Manhattan Supernatural

Every culture has its superstitions and its supermen: the German imp, the South African giant Abiyoyo, the golem of Jewish lore, and the jinni of Arabic mythology. What if, during one of America’s great waves of immigration, 2 of these mythic creatures collided?

That’s what happens in The Golem and the Jinni, Helene Wecker's compulsively readable debut novel. At the junction of 19th-century NYC's Little Syria and the Jewish Lower East Side, Chava, a female golem, meets Ahmad, a once-powerful jinni. Chava, who was created by a slightly sinister, failed rabbi to wed a man who died en route to America, now serves no master—not technically, anyway. But poor Chava feels compelled to help everyone whose fears or desires she senses: an impulse that can be a pleasure or a liability. And Ahmad has been trapped inside a metal vessel for centuries, imprisoned after a battle he doesn't remember.

As Chava's jealous creator and Ahmad's captor catch up with them, Wecker's writing jumps between magic realism and fantasy, existential exploration and adventure.

It's not quite your grandmother's immigration story. Or is it?

- Leah Falk 

Monday, June 10, 2013

The Gospel According to Jesus’s Mom


 
The more familiar a story, the greater the challenge for a novelist. How do you convince readers to look out for more than they already know? Naomi Alderman's 3rd novel, The Liars' Gospel, takes on this challenge: in 4 richly interior, interwoven narratives, Alderman reimagines the effect of Jesus's—Yehoshuah's—life and teaching on his Jewish friends, family, and their Roman-ruled society.

Rooted in primary texts—The Jewish War, the Talmud, and the Gospels themselves—the novel's dramatis personae isn't too surprising. We follow Mary (here known as Miryam), Judas (or Iehuda), and Caiaphas the High Priest of the Second Temple, all in the political aftermath of Yehoshuah's crucifixion. But we also hear from an anonymous Jewish rebel, Bar-Avo, who has a serendipitous encounter with Yehoshuah just before Yehoshuah is put to death.

Admirable in its ability to bring a few ancient facts vividly to life, The Liars' Gospel also puts forth a theory of storytelling: that the most powerful stories start with a lie. "Do not believe that an impartial observer exists," Alderman warns, suggesting that the multiple "gospels" of her characters—each biased for their own reasons—are as close to the truth as this story is going to get.

- Leah Falk for Jewniverse

Monday, June 3, 2013

A Bus Accident in Israel, and Afterward


"After living with a disability for 22-plus years and trying in vain to write about it for almost as many, I've finally gotten my thoughts down on paper." So Joshua Prager introduces his new memoir Half-Life, which details the aftermath of a devastating bus accident that occurred on his visit to Israel at age 19.

In the e-book Prager renders himself astonishingly vulnerable, in part by asking difficult questions: If I no longer feel like myself, am I still myself? And if I'm not, how do I interact with others?

In finely crafted language ("a cement staircase lined with dirt and dead thistles depositing me at the edge") Prager shares piercing details, ruminations, and conclusions about his journey through grief into recovery. He offers, for example, his experience with Brown-Séquard Syndrome, "which roughly meant that one half of me could move better, the other half feel better."

He fills the pages with selections of poetry and returns again and again to Herman Melville, whose words he uses to investigate not just what it has meant to cope with the immense loss of the life he knew, but what it means for anyone to understand and accept themselves.
Watch Prager's TED Talk here.

- Jessica Young