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Books: For Discussion
The Union for Reform Judaism recommends two Significant Jewish Books each quarter for individuals and book groups. Study and discussion guides are available at http://urj.org/books.
Mr. Sammler's Planet by Saul Bellow From the first scene of the novel (Sammler witnessing a pickpocket on the Broadway bus) to the last (Elya lying on his deathbed at the hospital as his son and daughter quarrel over the inheritance), Bellow describes the world as seen by Mr. Sammler. He struggles to find reasons for his survival--or, rather, why anyone would want to survive in a society plunging headlong into another dark age. The elderly gentleman, drudging along the streets of New York with his trench coat and umbrella, wonders if integrity still matters in such a world--and ultimately decides, it does. Saul Bellow (1915-2005), Nobel Prize laureate and winner of the Pulitzer Prize, is credited for bringing distinctively Jewish characters into mainstream American fiction--and for revealing both the uniqueness and shortcomings of American society through them. In The Adventures of Augie March, the Jewish narrator confidently introduces himself: "I am an American, Chicago born..." In Mr. Sammler's Planet, a European Jew--who already witnessed the decline of one society--presents an incisive commentary on ours. Read Significant Jewish Books Discussion Guide The Provincials: A Personal History of Jews in the South by Eli N. Evans Evans uses his own family history as an example: both sets of grandparents came from Lithuania at the turn of the century. Starting out as peddlers, they opened general stores--filling a vital role between the "genteel aristocracy" and poor whites and blacks--and emerged as valued members of their communities. When one of his grandfathers, Eli Nachamson, returned from a business trip, the whole town came to greet him at the train station--to inform him that his wife had given birth to their ninth child--and first son. Even in smaller cities and towns, Evans observes, Jews often took prominent public roles. His father, Emanuel "Mutt" Evans, served as mayor of Durham for six consecutive terms starting in 1952; his mother, Sara Nachamson Evans, started the first southern branch of Hadassah, traveling and speaking at synagogues throughout the South. "They were not insular but rather believed ardently in participating in the civic and organizational life of the community," he writes. Evans interviewed Southern Jews in eleven states to flesh out a portrait of Jewish life. "Jews were not aliens in the promised land but a blood-and-bones part of the South itself," he concludes in this insightful work of social and personal history. Bonny V. Fetterman is literary editor of Reform Judaism magazine. Read Significant Jewish Books Discussion Guide
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Mr. Sammler woke up in Manhattan and tried to get a handle on the situation. He didn't think he could." Thus begins another day in the life of Artur Sammler, a 70-year-old Holocaust survivor living in New York's Upper West Side, who tries in vain to understand the strange planet he landed on. America of the late-1960s is a land of boundless possibilities--taking a giant step for humankind with the first man to walk on the moon. But on the ground, Sammler sees the decay of civilization all around him: racial tensions, an entire generation in revolt, urban crime, and the universal lack of civility. Most disappointing of all, the children in his family--his own daughter as well as the grown children of his beloved nephew Elya Gruner--are lunatics, ingrates, and worse. He sees an unhappy generation unable to take care of itself.
Eli Evans, a native son of Durham, North Carolina, first published his classic history of Jews in the American South in 1973. He called it "The Provincials"--a tongue-in-cheek choice--to tweak the popular image of Southern Jews as marginal Jews living on both the periphery of Southern culture and Jewish history. To the contrary, he demonstrates that Southern Jews were an integral, though overlooked, part of the American Jewish story.
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