Chaim Potok (1929–2002)

Many folks probably remember this book from their high school days but, somehow, it wasn't on the curriculum in my school. I suspect because of some latent anti-Semitism or overly conservative Christian mentality in the place I grew up. I'm sorry I wasn't exposed to Potok's beautiful and thoughtful book earlier. He focuses on two Jewish boys, one Orthodox and one Hasidic, in '40s New York. After meeting in a bloody baseball game (easily one of the best baseball writings I've ever read), they show more become friends and change each other's lives. The change doesn't flow from any privileged sense of right and wrong - which might be expected from their communities - but from earnest thought and exposure to new thinking and concepts. The way these boys change makes this book as relevant today as it was when it was written, especially in a world where folks draw so many lines around themselves to pronounce themselves superior. And if you're going to read the book, seek out thus 50th anniversary edition which has additional essays from the author and others about the book - these were as enjoyable as the book itself. Potok is one of those rare authors who can speak intelligently and directly about his writing, its goals, inspirations, and meanings. Most authors will say, "I don't know where that came from." But Potok reveals his work in a way that is very instructive. show less

I seem to have inadvertently found myself on a theological reading streak. Like The Alchemist, this book was recommended to me by a friend (although more enthusiastically), and also like The Alchemist, I picked it up for reasons that ended up having nothing to do with the book. I thought The Chosen was about baseball.

It's not about baseball.

What it is about, at its core, is exactly the same thing The Alchemist is about (which almost defies coincidence): the power of silence, listening to show more your heart/soul, and following your own true path. But while The Alchemist uses parable, allegory and fantastic storytelling to get its message across, The Chosen tells the same message using an opposite style, set in WWII New York, and using first person-past tense POV. This is the story of two boys brought together by a softball game; one is a Hasidic Jew and one is Conservative (I think–it's never explicitly stated whether he's Conservative or Reform). Although they live only 5 blocks apart, they inhabit completely different worlds within the same religious faith, and have very different relationships with their respective fathers.

I can't do justice to this book in my review, but it works for me so much better than The Alchemist did; while I could appreciate the beauty of the writing and the story Coelho created, Potok's creation had the profound effect on me that I think the author was aiming for. The Chosen is going to be one of those that stay with me permanently.

Book themes for Hanukkah: Any book whose main character is Jewish, any story about the Jewish people show less

A novel of great power and dark truth. From a very young age, Asher Lev exhibits a gift for drawing, and it consumes him, even in the face of his parents' disdain and discouragement. Drawing is foolishness, a waste of time, his father feels. When Asher wakes up to find he has drawn a disturbing portrait on the wall beside his bed without remembering it, when he drifts off in class and then realizes he has again been drawing unconsciously (this time in a sacred text), the matter becomes show more terribly serious for his father, a prominent member of Brooklyn's Hasidic community, a representative of the Ladover Rebbe in the halls of the US government and around the world. This must not continue. Asher protests that he must draw, that he cannot help himself, which only confirms his father's belief that this "gift" is from the Other Side, not from the Master of the Universe. Only animals cannot control themselves. Asher loves his parents, he observes the rituals and offers the prayers, he tries to apply himself to his secular and religious studies. Yet as he gets older the gift gets stronger; his talent is undeniable; his study of great art leads him away from the cloistered existence of his insular community, and exposes him to centuries of Christian and "pagan" images. What reconciliation of the two worlds is possible? Can an artist be true to his vision without causing grief? Faulkner said, "The writer's only responsibility is to his art. He will be completely ruthless if he is a good one. ... If a writer has to rob his mother, he will not hesitate; the Ode on a Grecian Urn is worth any number of old ladies." That's all well and good from the distance of a couple hundred years, but delving into the life of a young man grappling with this awful dilemma makes one wonder a bit. In the context of this story, I came away feeling that Asher Lev might have fulfilled his artistic responsibility, and yet have found a way to be slightly less brutal to his parents. Yes, he had to crucify his mother on canvas. OK. But he did not have to let his parents come upon that image unwarned in a public manner. He considered it cowardly not to express his mother's anguish in precisely that way, but did not realize it was also cowardly to avoid the uncomfortable conversation that would have spared both parents the shock and horror of seeing the result, which they could only view as blasphemy and a betrayal? Very often, when faced with a difficult question, Asher remains quiet, as if unable to speak when he knows his answer will be hurtful or unacceptable. In the end, his silence leads to what may be an irreparable rift. show less

I wrote the review below on April 19, just after finishing the book.

I just finished this and a lot of the emotional impact happens near the end, and it's not a surprise, it's not a crazy plot twist or anything of that sort, it's just really well presented and moving on readers like me, and it makes looking that the book overall kind of immediately difficult.

Potok published this in 1990, about 18 years after My Name is Asher Lev and the story takes places 20 years after the former book, show more mainly in 1988. And it's possible he didn't he write anything comparable to his early books in those intervening years. So, to me, it's a bit noteworthy that he pulled this off and kept the same sense in the book that he had created in the My Name is Asher Lev.

I don't think this book is as good as My Name is Asher Lev, mind you, but I did get lost in it. Potok spends a lot of the book creating an experience of the plot. There are endless descriptions, but it works in setting the tone and building up the reader-experience of the book. It's impressive stuff. Within this he brings in his sense of cyclic and daily ritual which he takes from Jewish and Hasidic Jewish tradition, by repetition of experience and of cycles. For example morning descriptions don't tell all the details of a morning, but each is careful to include Asher Lev telling us he did his morning prayers with the same tone that singles it out as something for the reader to note and think about.

And I think Potok intentionally throws the reader, as he brings up the hyper-conservative political aspects of Hasidic Judaism, which aren't outright disturbing here, but verge that way. In 1988 and 1990 this wasn't yet the gigantic problem in Israel that is today, but it existed and it was uncomfortable and perhaps Potok had some foresight where it might lead. In any case it lets us feel Asher Lev's ambivalence and discomfort with the black & white world of his own Hasidism. This is just part of the book, and I'm getting carried away on it. Again, for the second time this year, I have enjoyed Potok.

2014 (link actually goes to kind of post-review comments)
https://www.librarything.com/topic/172769#4697523 show less