The Healer, by Israeli author Aharon Appelfeld, is a story about faith and faithlessness among European Jews on the eve of World War II. The main character is a Viennese businessman whose life is choked by his suppressed rage and an intolerance for those who keep the Jewish faith and tradition. When conventional methods fail to cure his daughter's emotional illness, he agrees to travel with his family to the Carpathian Mountains in search of a famous healer. After confronting the holy man and living snowbound for months in a rural Jewish village that sustains itself on faith, he returns to a Vienna plagued by anti-Semitism.
Our excerpt reprints the first four chapters, wherein the characters are introduced and the holy man gives his advice.
Born in Bukovina in 1932, author Appelfeld survived the Holocaust, in which his parents were killed. Imprisoned in a Nazi forced labor camp when he was eight years old, he escaped and lived three years hiding in the forest. Our commentator Joseph Cohen, author of Voices of Israel, finds themes and concerns in Appelfeld's work that stem form the author's extraordinary life. The Healer is Aharon Appelfeld's eighth novel to be published in English.
A second commentary on The Healer is by Juliana Geron Pilon, an author and director of the National Forum Foundation. She reviews the story and compares Appelfeld's idea with philosophical questions of faith raised by Thomas Mann and others.
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