The rabbi's grandson
The Rabbi's grandson (original title: Inside, Outside ) is a novel by the American writer Herman Wouk , which was published in 1985 by Little, Brown and Company and first published in German in 1986 by Knaus Verlag .
action
In the year of Watergate - the scandal , in 1973, receiving the New York lawyer specializing in tax law , the position of Israel David Goodkind a special assistant in the bar of the US president . This ultimately insignificant post in the White House enables him to reveal his ironic perspective inside the political control center and in the midst of everyday political life with all its intrigues in front of the reader, while at the same time writing his own biography. In various flashbacks, the prehistory of a rabbi's grandson is revealed : from his Russian - Jewish ancestors around 1900 to the time after the Second World War and the Yom Kippur War .
expenditure
- Herman Wouk: Inside, Outside , Little, Brown and Company , Boston 1985, ISBN 0-316-95504-3
- Herman Wouk: The Rabbi's grandson . German by Anita Krätzer and Helmut Kossodo . Consultant in the translation and handling of Yiddish , Hebrew and Aramaic text passages: Rachel Salamander and Robert Strain, Knaus Verlag , Munich / Hamburg 1986, 733 pages, ISBN 3-8135-0144-2
- Herman Wouk: The Rabbi's grandson . Goldmann Verlag TB, Munich 1989, ISBN 3-442-09438-0
background
The position of special assistant for dealing with Israel on the US President's staff is pure fiction. The autobiographical traits of the plot, analogous to the author's life story, are intentional. The description of his fictional work colleague Peter Quat is based on Philip Roth , that of his superior Harry Goldhandler is based on David Freedman . Even if Richard Nixon is never mentioned by name, it is obvious which President Wouk describes in the book, in the course of which Goodkind comes into contact with numerous celebrities: Golda Meir , Zero Mostel , Bert Lahr , Marlene Dietrich , John Barrymore , Ernest Hemingway , Leslie Howard , as well as brothers George Gershwin and Ira Gershwin .
review
For a review of the book Der Enkel des Rabbi, the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung actually ran the headline Die Verrückte Mischpoke , which today seems to be more interesting about the history of the reception of Yiddish Mischpoche in German.
Individual evidence
- ^ FAZ, December 12, 1986
- ^ Hans Peter Althaus : Zocker, Zoff & Zores: Yiddish words in German . CH Beck, Munich 2002, p. 112. ISBN 3-406-476163