Regardless of the foreign culture and terminology, I did enjoy the story. While the book is hardly the page turner that Little Brother is, I found myself wanting to continue because I was curious as to how the story unfolded. But I can't help but ask myself if the character of Landsman was entirely realistic. He seemed like a completely different character by the end of the book. I am not completely sure of this, but doesn't the entire story (minus the flashbacks, of course) take place within a week? A little more or less? Does anyone else feel like this?
Wednesday, September 2, 2009
My Thoughts on The Yiddish Policemen's Union
I agree with the comments of others who said that they found the unfamiliar terminology distracting. To me, the majority of the words seemed to sound the same, and seeing as I know absolutely zilch about Jewish culture (or any religion for that matter), I found myself confused often. In addition, I also have never been a big history buff either. So I was thankful for knowing that this book was an alternate history before I began, or...
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I eventually gave up, but here is a list of words that I wasn't sure of:
ReplyDeleteyid, sholem, shammes, esperanto, nokh amol, shtarkers, lumpia, latke, momzer, shochet, papiros, valise, ingot, pushke, reliquary, pogrom, black hat, schlemiel, caisson, kibitzer, mezuzah, furze, mukluks, schmaltz, zwischenzug, kaddish, shoymer, nox, sheygets, goy, spiel, shul, shtinker, shpilkes, genef, dybbuk, shkotz, doggerel, emes, patzer, tohubohu.
A lot of those are easily figured out by context (if a sholem is loaded and holstered, I think everyone knows its a gun). But zwischenzug? Oy Vey!
I had some trouble keeping up with names and all of the terminology as well. I tried keeping notes, but gave up once I lost them about half way through the book. That was the only aspect of the book I had a problem with.
ReplyDeleteIsn't there a glossary in the back of the book? I dunno, the version I have has a glossary, and it's quite nifty.
ReplyDeleteAs for Landsman changing over such a short period of time, I guess that's sort of always going to be a point of contention in most drama. Ever since Joseph Cambell came up with the hero monomyth it seems like almost every main character changes in some capacity in the course of a story. But I guess that's one function of telling a story in general, to truncate time, get through all the mundane aspect of life, and focus on the transformative events that lead us to grow as people. But I do see what you mean, Landsman did change pretty abruptly.
this was a hard book for me to read. It just seemed to drag on and like most everyone has said, the terminology was very difficult to follow. With so many characters, I had problems remembering who was who.
ReplyDelete