Customer Reviews

God's Grace

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Bernard Malamud had a varied and interesting writing career. From Yakov Bok in the award winning "The Fixer" to the struggling artist Fidelman in "Pictures of Fidelman", to baseballer Roy Hobbs in "The Natural", he has painted portraits of a wide range of fascinating people, mostly Jewish men in middle age, faced with moral or ethical crises. Probably my favorite is Henry Lesser from "The Tenants", but Calvin Cohn in this novel comes in close. He is a pretty complex guy, in fact the last man left on earth after a thermonuclear holocaust wipes out the rest of civilization. Luckily for Cohn, he missed out on being killed by virtue of his being at the bottom of the ocean floor in scientific pursuits.

He befriends a highly intelligent chimp, whom he names Buz, who for a time is his sole companion in this "new world", and they make for themselves something idyllic on a deserted island, living off the land and some remaining supplies from the ship that Cohn had sailed out on (all of whose inhabitants have perished, along with the eccentric, Christian German scientist who raised the chimp). Buz becomes gifted with speech, the ability to learn and debate, mostly on religious topics; this makes for some fantastical and interesting exchanges on Jewish and Christian themes. Once the reader gets past the implausibility of verbal communication and debates between humans and primates and sees the story as metaphorical, this makes for a fascinating novel. It is short and highly readable, carrying themes that get to the root of what life is, who God is or isn't, and what belief and power can do, for good and evil. Malamud throws in some typical self deprecating Jewish wit, with guilt about God competing with man's attempts at intimacy with the Almighty.

Some of the developments are certainly uncomfortable (if you bristle at the thought of inter-species mating, as I and I am sure most of us do, you might have to suppress your imagination in parts). But the developments are necessary to the concepts that Malamud is putting forth. This was a rewarding story on many levels. Recommended to anyone who wants to be challenged to think about the meaning of life beyond mere convention.

In a thermonuclear war, the "Djanks" and "Druzhkies" destroy themselves, and all other inhabitants of the earth. Calvin Cohn, a paleologist who is in a diving bell off a research vessel at the time of the disaster, miraculously survives.

He finds that another being is aboard the research ship-a chimpanzee whom he calls "Buz." The two of them end up on a tropical island, where Cohn finds that Buz has a couple of electric wires protruding from his throat-and when Cohn connects them, the chimp is able to speak.

Cohn and Buz have a father-son sort of relationship, which gets complicated when they eventually find that a few other apes have also survived. Amazingly, the other chimpanzees on the island also acquire the power of speech, and Cohn becomes their teacher. They also receive periodic and enigmatic visits form "George," a gorilla, who is drawn to the sound of Cohn's father's cantorial recordings, which Cohn saved from the ship, along with a wind-up record player. The chimps are afraid of and dislike George, but Cohn sees something in him that keeps him trying to communicate with the ape, despite his lack of verbal skills.

Cohn tries to get the chimps to learn from the mistakes of mankind, to see themselves as capable of repopulating the earth with a race that does not make the same mistakes as Man. However, despite their relative sophistication, the chimps exhibit many of the same unpleasant characteristics found in humans. One of the chimpanzees is a female, Mary Madelyn, and she, of all the chimps, is the one who seems most capable of moral evolution. However, her insistence on being treated as a being with rights, who makes her own sexual choices, creates a crisis within the community.

This book has some very funny moments and is written in a wry, deadpan style. However, it is ultimately a tragedy with a message. When, with our free will, we choose to destroy God's gifts, we can't expect God to bail us out.

Calvin Cohn, a Jewish paleontologist, son of a rabbi, is the only human survivor of a thermonuclear disaster. He has to content himself with the company of a few chimps and baboons. God is responsible for this second flood and He blames humans for destroying nature; Cohn has survived due to an error and he is let to live and make the best he can. In this scenario of desolation, Cohn becomes a god-like creature, he believes he can recreate the world, impose a new social order based on high moral and spiritual values, hard working, order, aiming to turn his fellow chimps into a better lot than humans. Amongst the chimps there is "Buz", a Christian who has been taught how to speak, sweet "Mary Madelyn" the only reproductive female of the group, "Esau" the nonconformist, a mysterious albino ape, and the cast-out gorilla "George" who is enchanted by the cantor's singing...

This a novel heavy in meanings, in the use of parables, fables and allegories. Following Malamud's pessimistic outlook on human nature, Cohn is just one more of his characters standing in a long line of losers, an individual who fears his fate and becomes the object of ridicule and pity. In his disguised reincarnation of Adam, Moses, and finally Christ, Cohn symbolizes the necessity of gaining moral wisdom through suffering. In a metaphorical language and fantastic-like "Chagall" prose, Malamud creates a thought-disturbing novel, an account of human nature fragile standing, and a celebration to its strenghts as well as a lament to its weaknesses.

There's a staggering range of emotion here: from apocalyptic doom, to fearful survival, to irascible and choleric comedy, to wrenching simplicity of striving towards good, and bringing about a cataclysm. Humanity or, better still, human history personified... God's Grace is like Swift's Gulliver's travels: simple enough to captivate a casual reader, deep enough to drown a philosopher. A moving masterpiece.

Thoughts of the end times are popular with Hollywood; they're the stuff of two hour snippets of fantasy meant to entertain with special effects. This was not Bernard Malamud's approach in his 1980's vision of the apocalypse. His fable is meant to seduce us to the comfort of what we'd hope for--meaning through our religious upbringing--what we'd find comforting--remnants of the life we've lived--but, ultimately, it's a descent into the madness of Dantean afterlife of human suffering and agony. Ultimately, there is nothing one can expect to happen, there is no rational purpose for charity, education, or even love. God's grace is not a comfort, but it is the unexplainable suffering we cannot understand.

This is one of the only truly shocking books I have ever read. Malamud continues in dark Russian tradition, testing his narrator until he is stripped of all but his most basic humanities. This is why I read books

Extraordinary in it's humor, and provoking thought about God's involvement in the world order and everyday matters.

sure, malamud's plot seems trite and few could actually believe these events, but he does raise some valid points in apocalyptic literature. particularly engaging is the contrast between jews and christians and the nature of god according to each religion.

Yes, the subject matter is non-believable; but what about suspension of disbelief? The storyline is shocking, and really is best read for fun. I've always remembered this story, simply because of the "what-if?" scenario. Don't take it too seriously, but enjoy its STORY...

I became a fan of Malamud after reading The Assistant and was ready for another excellent travel but what I got was a awful account of man and ape and a storyline that came from a Roger Corman flick. The ending was so disappointing that I gave up on Malamud. The metal rods that he stuck in the ape's head is so corny that I was disgusted through the entire novel. Not his finest by far.