See Under: Love

by David Grossman

Book Overview

In this powerful novel by one of Israel's most prominent writers, Momik, the only child of Holocaust survivors, grows up in the shadow of his parents' history. Determined to exorcise the Nazi beast from their shattered lives and prepare for a second holocaust he knows is coming, Momik increasingly shields himself from all feeling and attachment. But through the stories his great-uncle tells him--the same stories he told the commandant of a Nazi...

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0312420692
• ISBN13: 9780312420697
• Release Date: January 2002
• Publisher: St. Martins Press-3PL
• Length: 464 Pages
• Weight: 0.98 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.4" x 5.5" x 8.4"

Customer Reviews

A monument of Israeli literature

As an Israeli who have read it in Hebrew, I would like to add a few words. One thing: this book is entirely different if you read it in Hebrew. It losses a lot in the translation, and not because the translation is bad, rather that the combination of different layers of very special Hebrew combined with Yiddish, along with the cultural context, makes it a book that is an impossible mission for the translator. Of course, you can't ask someone to learn Hebrew just for this book (and this still won't be enough, because he has to be born again as an Israeli and grow up here to understand everything...), but the book has numerous universal aspects that can be translated, and it's still, even after the translation, a must-read. And now, for the book itself (if there is such a thing the book itself...).This is by-far the greatest Israeli book that I have ever read. I had one feeling that went along with me throughout the journey: I don't know how the hell he did. I just don't know. Like a magician that makes a trick you just can't figure. The scope. The depth. I cannot describe this book. It defies space and time. It is a masterpiece.

See Under: Masterpiece

It was hard to read this novel. Grossman presents us with mysteries and references that require both faith and patience -- they are amply rewarded. Part of what delays the intrepid reader is the time required just to absorb, to make connections, to take deep breaths, to sob. The horror and disgust that one expects in a holocaust novel are there, but what pulls us up short are the compassion and, yes, love that emerge in the most unlikely places. It would be no help to read a synopsis of this book or to have a guide to its mysteries, because you read it in your heart and in the aqueous subconscious. Reading is always an act of love, a tryst of imagination with the writer. When it really goes well, when the miracle occurs, a child, a book is produced between them. It hovers luminously in the aether - real, profound, fleeting. See Under: Love invites us to into that relationship, helps us visualize it, and transforms our sense of what this world really is. There is plenty to study, learn, and analyze in Mr. Grossman's incredible work, but my first reading was a sacred experience. This book sat on my shelf for about eleven years. I gave a first edition of it to a young man obsessed with the holocaust who died a year later of a mysterious disease. I thought picking it up would mean acknowledging his absence - instead it reassured me of his presence. Prepare to be surprised.

This is a life-changing book

For any who reads and allows this book to really get into their consciousness, I believe it will alter the way one thinks and feels about the past (and current) century's greatest heartbreaks. Without sentimentality or easy new-age evasions, Grossman asks how ordinary people are drawn to collaborate with "evil" and what are the possibilites for redemption and forgiveness. Shortly after writing this book, Grossman was moved by his own conclusions to begin visiting Palestinian refugee camps in Israel which led to his next book, "The Yellow Wind. & quot...

Not just a book, but an experience

Ever since I have read Avraham B. Yehoshua's "The Lover" I have been a keen reader of Israeli literature, among great Hebrew writers such as Yehoshua, Oz and Shabtai, who wisely construct a fascinating description of a fragmented country, quilted of religions, faiths, ideology and culture and scarred by war and trauma, Grossman still stands out as an amazing craftsmen of words, plot and memories. This book does not deal merely with the Holocaust, but with the inability to deal with this unbelievable atrocity by those who survived it, their children, and the world. Never have I read a such a sophisticated book, such a genius and original use of genres and plotlines, and yet readable and sweeping. It would have been described as a page turner, but it is impossible to read it without pausing to breathe deeply and ponder. However you feel about this book, one thing is for sure - You wont be the same person. In my opinion, reading this book has made me a better person.Shocking, thrilling, amazing. A must.

Truly one of the best books I have ever read!

I am not much on book reviews, but I feel moved to tell everyone willing to listen how marvelous and seductively compelling this novel is. Every moment in the narrative is captured perfectly by Grossman's mixture of the esthetic and literary with the painful reality of the Holocaust. Please read it! I have no idea why this novel is not more widely known and more lavishly praised.