Like David Homel’s Midway, The End of the Jews by Adam Mansbach is a witty literary miniature with Jewish characters. Published in 2008, it tells the story of three interlocking characters — a grandfather and grandson both named Tristan Brodsky, and Nina Hricek, a teenaged photographer in Czechoslovakia. The narrative unfolds in the present tense…
Tag: American
Neil Simon memoir
by •
If the word “bittersweet” has often been associated with phenomenal American playwright Neil Simon, one need only read his recent memoir Rewrites (Simon & Schuster, 1997) to understand why. In it, he shares a string of typically good-humored tales of his quick ascent up the ladder of theatrical success, from his days of writing for television…
Emma Lazarus bio
by •
Emma Lazarus, who died 120 years ago at the premature age of only 38, fixed her place in American literary history through her poem “The New Colossus,” which famously graces a bronze plaque at the base of the Statue of Liberty. Some of its stanzas are too well known to bear repeating even today, but,…
Gone but not forgotten: author Margaret Mitchell
by •
Timorous and untested as an author, Margaret Mitchell persuaded herself during her seven-year literary labour that the manuscript she was working on was so terrible it would never be printed. Like a woman enceinte but too modest or superstitious to tell anyone, she kept the project a secret from friends and acquaintances. Only her husband…
