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Reuben Sachs
 
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Reuben Sachs (Paperback)

by Amy Levy (Author), Julia Neuberger (Introduction)
4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (3 customer reviews)
RRP: £12.00
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Product details

  • Paperback: 198 pages
  • Publisher: Persephone Books Ltd (1 Mar 2001)
  • Language English
  • ISBN-10: 1903155126
  • ISBN-13: 978-1903155127
  • Product Dimensions: 20.8 x 13.8 x 1.8 cm
  • Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (3 customer reviews)
  • Amazon.co.uk Sales Rank: 204,823 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

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Product Description

The Independent on Sunday March 2001, Lisa Allardice

'Sadder but no less sparkling than Miss Pettigrew, this spirited satire is infused with a gentle melancholy.'


Product Description

This 1888 novel is about a couple who love each other, but his political ambitions demand money and she is poor. "Reuben Sachs" would be a fairly standard late-Victorian novel about the cruelty of the marriage market if it were not imbued with feminist polemic. Amy Levy (1861-89) was sharply critical of the empty lives led by women with nothing to do all day except gossip, play cards and go shopping. The setting is the Anglo-Jewish community in Bayswater, portrayed with a sardonic gaze that shocked contemporary readers. Yet the author's theme was broader, for she was in part reacting against Daniel Deronda: she believed that George Eliot had romanticised her Jewish characters and that no novelist had yet described the modern Jew with 'his surprising virtues and no less surprising vices.'Oscar Wilde observed: 'Its directness, its uncompromising truths, its depth of feeling, and above all, its absence of any single superfluous word, make "Reuben Sachs", in some sort, a classic'. Julia Neuberger writes in her Preface, 'This is a novel about women, and Jewish women, about families, and Jewish families, about snobbishness, and Jewish snobbishness'; while in the "Independent on Sunday", Lisa Allardice said: 'Sadder but no less sparkling than Miss Pettigrew, "Reuben Sachs" is another forgotten classic by an accomplished female novelist. Amy Levy might be described as a Jewish Jane Austen.'
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Customer Reviews

3 Reviews
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Average Customer Review
4.0 out of 5 stars (3 customer reviews)
 
 
 
 
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6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars A reply to Daniel Deronda, 17 May 2001
By A Customer
Amy Levy's short novel explores a Jewish community in London in the 1880's. It has been called a reply to George Eliot's "Daniel Deronda" which portrayed a very romantic view of Jewish society. Levy is much harsher, more satirical in her portraits of the famillies in her novel. Reuben Sachs is a young man who, in his mother's words, "will do nothing rash". He is destined for a brilliant political career, but he needs to marry money to support his ambitions, and he is unfortunately in love with Judith Quixano, who is beautiful but poor. Judith loves Reuben, but their love is undeclared, although both their famillies gossip about them. As well as satirising the vulgarity and snobbishness of her community, Levy also makes a plea to change the aimless lives of young women who can have no career but marriage. This, of course, wasn't restricted to Jewish girls of the period. Judith is intelligent, but she relies on Reuben for books and conversation about politics. She lives with a family who spends any amount on material possessions, but sees money spent on books as wasted. Judith's fate is unsurprising, but the journey we take with her is fascinating. Amy Levy died young (she committed suicide at the age of 27), otherwise we might have more novels of this quality on the Jewish experience in Britain.
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1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars Interesting discovery from Persephone, 7 April 2007
By Jaybird (London, UK) - See all my reviews
(TOP 500 REVIEWER)   
Reuben Sachs is the love affair between Reuben Sachs and his "cousin", Judith Quinxano, in London in the late 19th century. At the time that it was written it was an exploration of the contemporary mores in Jewish, upper middle class society.

In some ways it covers the same ground that Jane Austen had earlier: the inferior position of women in society; their lack of opportunities for education or a career; the necessity of marriage; and the importance of a dowry as a cash injection for a young man.

More than that, it is an exploration of both the positive and (more often) negative aspects of the close, sometimes claustrophobic, Jewish set at the time.

To modern readers, Levy's descriptions of the Eastern appearance, sallow skin, gaudiness of dress, and focus on materialism, sound anti-Semitic, so it was interesting to read that the novel was received as such at the time. But there is more to her book than that. Whilst railing against the insular nature of her society, she also recognises its strengths and attractions.

The book is set over a comparatively short period of time, a clever construction which allows her to impart a vivid description of life as it was at the time, without losing narrative drive.

Julia Neuberger's preface is helpful in setting the scene into its historical context, although she restrains from a literary critique.

An interesting read.
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4.0 out of 5 stars Enjoyable surprise, 24 April 2009
This is my second favourite Persephone book so far after 'Miss Pettigrew'. Amy Levy was called the 'Jewish Jane Austen' for a reason. This book is full of domestic detail, and the plot, although slight, is there, and the book has a surprising but satisfactory ending.
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