In the political and social chaos that followed WWI, Jewish communities throughout Europe found themselves in new, often contradictory positions that seemed to suggest fresh possibilities for integration, explains Sachar (author of the highly regarded The History of Jews in America) in this accessible overview of the interwar Jewish experience. In Hungary, for instance, despite a violent outbreak of postwar anti-Semitism, a new coalition government was headed by the Jewish army officer Bela Kun. Sachar, a history professor at George Washington University, weaves a broad tapestry of social, economic and political conditions that is at times dizzying in its complexity and breadth. He looks at this hopeful era primarily through the stories of influential individuals like composer Arnold Schoenberg and socialist revolutionary Rosa Luxemburg, as well as less well-known figures such as Walther Rathenau, a Jewish businessman who became a diplomat in post-WWI Germany. Sachar has a keen eye for historical detail, and a fine sense of narrative. Yet the book feels uneven at times, offering a great deal of detail on some subjects (like the byzantine politics of interwar Czechoslovakia) that seems at odds with the more general sketches of figures like Freud and Proust. Nonetheless, it gives general readers a sense of the enormous diversity of experience among Jews during this time—whether peasants, intellectuals, businessmen, atheists or believers—and a concise explanation of how anti-Semitic stereotypes responded to this variety, eventually giving way to the devastations of the Holocaust. (Mar. 14)
Forecast: Despite its flaws, this will appeal to general readers interested in either Jewish studies or European history. Good reviews could move it initially, and it should have steady, if slow, continuing sales.
