The Last of the Just

By André Schwarz-Bart

Book Overview

Andre Schwarz-Bart's renowned novel The Last of the Just is "a triumphant monument to the nobility and tenacity of the human spirit" (Chicago Sun-Times).

On March 11, 1185, in the old Anglican city of York, the Jews of the city were brutally massacred by their townsmen. As legend has it, God blessed the only survivor of this medieval pogrom, Rabbi Yom Tov Levy, as one of the Lamed-Vov, the 36 Just Men of Jewish tradition, a blessing which extended to one Levy of each succeeding generation.

This terrifying and remarkable legacy is traced over eight centuries, from the Spanish Inquisition, to expulsions from England, France, Portugal, Germany, and Russia, and to the small Polish village of Zemyock, where the Levys settle for two centuries in relative peace. It is in the 20th century that Ernie Levy emerges, The Last of the Just, in 1920s Germany, as Hitler's sinister star is on the rise and the agonies of Auschwitz loom on the horizon.

This classic work is one of those few novels that, once read, is never forgotten.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 1585670162
• ISBN13: 9781585670161
• Release Date: February 2000
• Publisher: Abrams, Inc.
• Length: 374 Pages
• Weight: 0.82 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.1" x 5.4" x 8.0"
• Age Range: 18 years and up
• Grade Range: Grade 12 and higher

Customer Reviews

Jewish history as a story of suffering

The legend of the Thirty- Six Just Men , the Lamed Vov whose righteousness sustains the world is at the heart of this work. It traces a family of such Just Men through generations of suffering, and climaxes with Ernie Levy, the Last of the Just whose sufferings in the Shoah( Holocaust) bring the story to a climax and an end. The powerful and painfully poetic conclusion of this story is one of the most moving in Literature. In one sense it might be said that the work presents a one- sided view of Jewish history. But it does tell the story of Jewish suffering through the generations and in the Shoah with incredible compassion and feeling. And it arouses in the reader too a deep identification and sympathy with that history, and with the story and ongoing life of the Jewish people.

One Powerful Book!!!

OK, you've read many holocaust books, probably seen several movies, been there, done that.This one is different, and different in so many ways that you'll never believe you've read one before.Of course there are not many that start the story in 1105, that's different. There are not many that try to fix the story in a context that is greater than the ending. This one does that, and makes it so strong that you can not put it down.First the context, the myth if you will. There are in the world 36 `just men' that take on the suffering of the world, that are the reasons God allows the world to continue. There are among these men, some number of `unknown just' who see the world differently from most of us. That when one of these `unknown just' dies his soul is so cold that God must hold him in his fingers for a thousand years so that he can open to paradise. Ernie Levy is one of those men. A thousand years of history, two thousand years of suffering are all concentrated in the story of one boy, the movement of a family from Poland, to Germany, to France, to extermination. It's all so simple. It's all so wonderfully told. The story of a people, the story of a family, the story of a man, the story of the twentieth century, all in so few pages.I hope you'll take the time to read it.

A brilliant, moving book

My Dad told me to read this book, and when I finally did, it was well worth it. It tells the story of a legend of a dynasty, so to speak, of just men. They are people who cannot abide by injustice, and often sacrifice their lives for the sake of justice. Young Ernie Levy is recognized as the just man of his generation at a very young age. He grapples with the mixed blessing and curse of being a just man, and feeling others pain, for the Nazi's have just come to power and have begun persecuting the Jews. The story tells how Ernie tries to come to terms with his lagacy at the same time as the Nazis release their unimaginable horror over Europe. The end, where the words of kaddish, the prayer for the dead, are interpsersed with the names of the death camps, the author shows us how great, and how terrible it is to be one of the 36 rightious people of the world.

A deeply moving and indelible picture of the Holocaust

Difficult to describe and impossible to forget, this book takes us out of whatever 'normal' world we inhabit and casts us into the horror of the Nazi's 'final solution'. The story of a young Jewish boy - the 'last of the Just' - is so powerful, so full of pain and confusion, so beautifully written, so honestly realized, that the reader will never be able to forget it. The last section alone, where the names of all the death camps are listed, in the midst of a kind of elegy, is among the most moving pieces of prose I have ever read. Read this book. It will change you and stay with you when everything else you have read about the holocaust is forgotten.