דער קערפער פֿון השם“I knew almost nothing about the #Jewish aspect, as opposed to the #Southern aspect, of my family’s history,” #Lemann, a staff #writer at the #NewYorker and #professor and dean emeritus at #Columbia #Journalism School, #writes in Returning: A Search for Home Across Three Centuries. Jewish was more the way others thought of the family than how they viewed themselves. Or so he thought.
Lemann’s #book is his fifth and his most personal, reaching back in time to uncover how his aristocratic, well-established life in #Louisiana was a relatively modern development following decades of #assimilation.
It is a family portrait in a unique milieu — #Faulkner and #RobertPennWarren meets #IrvingHowe’s World of Our Fathers — that follows the rough contours of the #Torah: the original sins of slavery, #Exodus and the conflicted push towards a promised land with political #Zionism and a codification of life as Lemann reclaims tradition. It’s a compelling read..."
