- Hardcover: 408 pages
- Publisher: Simon & Schuster; First Edition edition (3 Nov 2009)
- Language English
- ISBN-10: 1416547967
- ISBN-13: 978-1416547969
- Product Dimensions: 24.2 x 16.6 x 3.4 cm
- Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars See all reviews (1 customer review)
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Amazon Bestsellers Rank:
571,190 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- #50 in Books > Religion & Spirituality > Judaism > Sacred Writings > Talmud
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Customer Reviews
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
1 of 1 people found the following review helpful
Format:Hardcover
As a non Jew but with an interest in European history, I found the book really gripping. It is well written, pacy and full of fascinating vignettes of Jewish life from the late 18th century to the rise of the National Socialists in Germany in 1933. It is reminiscent of Simon Schama in the way that it takes individuals and uses their lives and experiences to illustrate what was happening in whole communities across the continent, following the emancipation of the Jews after the French Revolution. The book depicts how you get from a family of peddlars and mystics to intellects like Freud or Schoenberg in 3 generations, how the Jews grasped the opportunities offered them with both hands and made the leap, both psychologically and materially, from the Dark Ages and into the 20th century, dragging most of Europe along with them. The parallels between the Jewish community in Vienna in the mid-19th century and the Jewish community in New York 50 years later is plain, and the author also makes the reader think about what this means for immigrant communities in contemporary Europe, for Islamic, Chinese, Africans, who strive for greater things whilst living in exile in their own countries.
Most Helpful Customer Reviews on Amazon.com (beta)
Amazon.com:
7 reviews
15 of 21 people found the following review helpful
Well-researched, and yet nothing new
15 Nov 2009
Format:Hardcover
Mr. Goldfarb has indeed written an excellent history of the emancipation of Europe's Jews, well-researched but adding almost nothing new to the story. He writes with the commendable style of a good journalist who avoids commentary. This is fine as far as it goes, but even in his epilogue, where he depicted individual responses to being emancipated, he seemingly leaves its beneficiaries unable to actualize that status, albeit through no innate fault of their own.
Had he shaped his narrative using the term modernity, he might have provided a coherency to the story. He opens with Spinoza, the first 'Modern' Jew, but fails to grasp the import of the word. He correctly focuses on the fact that it was Gentiles who initiated Emancipation, without overtly stating that without them there would have been no Emancipation. Jews locked inside of Ghetto walls were in no position to initiate anything (and as he also states, did not, in many cases, want to).
He makes much of the self-emancipation of Jews in Vienna, but does not attach any consequence to the fact that the society they created there was, while German-speaking, not 'German', as pointed out by the reactions of the Anti-Semites he cites.
One quibble: Mr. Goldfarb translates all German newspaper names into English every time, but from French only at the first occurence. In addition, he does not translate Alliance Israelite Universelle at all, assuming that his audience is like him, conversant in French. This is confirmed in his bibliography, which includes sources in French, but nothing in German (even if in translation). Perhaps that is an explanation for his usage of 'The Jewish State' as the English translation of 'Der Judenstaat', when in fact it should be 'The Jews' State', not quite the same thing.
'Emancipation into What?' might have been a better title, but the author never asked the question, and so this book remains limited to telling a story without a point.
Had he shaped his narrative using the term modernity, he might have provided a coherency to the story. He opens with Spinoza, the first 'Modern' Jew, but fails to grasp the import of the word. He correctly focuses on the fact that it was Gentiles who initiated Emancipation, without overtly stating that without them there would have been no Emancipation. Jews locked inside of Ghetto walls were in no position to initiate anything (and as he also states, did not, in many cases, want to).
He makes much of the self-emancipation of Jews in Vienna, but does not attach any consequence to the fact that the society they created there was, while German-speaking, not 'German', as pointed out by the reactions of the Anti-Semites he cites.
One quibble: Mr. Goldfarb translates all German newspaper names into English every time, but from French only at the first occurence. In addition, he does not translate Alliance Israelite Universelle at all, assuming that his audience is like him, conversant in French. This is confirmed in his bibliography, which includes sources in French, but nothing in German (even if in translation). Perhaps that is an explanation for his usage of 'The Jewish State' as the English translation of 'Der Judenstaat', when in fact it should be 'The Jews' State', not quite the same thing.
'Emancipation into What?' might have been a better title, but the author never asked the question, and so this book remains limited to telling a story without a point.
8 of 11 people found the following review helpful
Who knew....
4 Dec 2009
Format:Kindle Edition|Amazon Verified Purchase
This is a fascinating read for non-Jews .... maybe even for members of the tribe. It is well written and hard to put down and I find that an unusual thing to say about a history, but If more history were written this way there would be more people reading it. I bought it on Kindle, a great device with a limited catalog, and would very much like to hear it read by Goldfarb, an occasional radio presenter and reporter for NPR and the BBC.
It gave me a better understanding of European history from middle ages till the present and I will likely to re-read it. It is information rich and lends itself to some study especially by those of us who are only casually informed about the history of the Hebrew people - outside of the Bible - and European Liberalism.
It gave me a better understanding of European history from middle ages till the present and I will likely to re-read it. It is information rich and lends itself to some study especially by those of us who are only casually informed about the history of the Hebrew people - outside of the Bible - and European Liberalism.
3 of 4 people found the following review helpful
There is so much to learn !
7 July 2010
Format:Hardcover|Amazon Verified Purchase
What an interesting, and for me a revealng and well written book. I admit I knew far too little of this period in my tribe's history. Clearly, it is about only a slice of the greater story of the "emancipation" of the proletariat in Europe at the time, but a very important and large slice. This book is easy to read, hard to put down and very well constructed.
Like Goldfarb's story of his ancestor leaving Odessa and making it to NY, my forbears left the Poznan region in Prussia (at the time) around 1850 and went to live in the slums of Whitechapel in East End of London and then eventually on to Australia. The report on Heine's visit and impression of poverty of Jews living in Poznan was a revelation for me. I always figured Whitechapel was a hell hole but perhaps it was an improvement on Poznan!
However, this book also made me think of the emancipation of blacks in the USA and the rough road they have travelled. There are parallels here in regard to the continuing struggle to make it into the mainstream and the undercurrent discrimination from which they still suffer. We now have a black US President, albeit not of those same roots, but what will it take for full "freedom" in the land of the free?
The other striking point is the interesting disparity in the comments from Amazon readers. We even have one person managing to read into Goldfarb's text an admission to Jewish culpability for the French Revolution and the Reign of Terror! Sounds a bit like the split in the German community under Bismarck. Surely this is "finding facts" to support a predisposition.
Like Goldfarb's story of his ancestor leaving Odessa and making it to NY, my forbears left the Poznan region in Prussia (at the time) around 1850 and went to live in the slums of Whitechapel in East End of London and then eventually on to Australia. The report on Heine's visit and impression of poverty of Jews living in Poznan was a revelation for me. I always figured Whitechapel was a hell hole but perhaps it was an improvement on Poznan!
However, this book also made me think of the emancipation of blacks in the USA and the rough road they have travelled. There are parallels here in regard to the continuing struggle to make it into the mainstream and the undercurrent discrimination from which they still suffer. We now have a black US President, albeit not of those same roots, but what will it take for full "freedom" in the land of the free?
The other striking point is the interesting disparity in the comments from Amazon readers. We even have one person managing to read into Goldfarb's text an admission to Jewish culpability for the French Revolution and the Reign of Terror! Sounds a bit like the split in the German community under Bismarck. Surely this is "finding facts" to support a predisposition.
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