Jacob the Liar [Hardcover]

Jurek Becker (Author), Leila Vennewitz (Translator)

Book Description

Publication Date: February 7, 1996

Cut off from all news of the war along with thousands of fellow prisoners, Jacob Heym accidentally overhears a radio broadcast that reveals the Red Army's advancement and is forced to tell a series of lies in order to explain his knowledge.

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

This fable of a Jewish ghetto during World War II is one of the great literary masterworks of the Holocaust. Published in Germany in 1969, it is only now appearing in an authorized English translation. Concerning a former cafe owner who fabricates the story of the Russian army's inexorable advance on the ghetto, and the liberation that will follow their arrival, the tale has the simple power of myths or dreams. A comic tale of unimaginable tragedy, the novel brings vividly to life the doomed inhabitants of the ghetto: Schmidt, the obtuse assimilationist; the child, Lina, who hunts for Jacob's imaginary radio; Frankfurte,r the formerly obese burgher. And Jacob himself, a storyteller whose inventions become like bread to the others, who finds himself trapped in his growing mesh of lies until he is driven to tell the truth. At the end there are two final passages: one in which the Russians arrive to save the ghetto; and one in which they don't. Who is to distinguish between fact and myth?

From Publishers Weekly

Twenty-seven years after its initial German publication, this celebrated?and out-of-print?novel of life and death in a Nazi-occupied Jewish ghetto during WW II appears here in the translation authorized by the author, a Jewish Holocaust survivor. In the midst of a morally inverted universe where the monstrously wicked has become utterly commonplace, Jacob Heym, a yellow star on his chest, gives hope to his fellow ghetto occupants by telling them he has clandestinely overheard a radio report that Russian troops are advancing and will soon liberate the ghetto. One life-sustaining lie leads to another as the former eatery owner, who now does back-breaking forced labor in a freight yard, circulates invented radio news of German defeats and Allied progress. Jacob's stories halt a stream of suicides, even though savage beatings, shootings, executions, starvation and deportations to concentration camps continue unabated. In a moving, almost hallucinatory, narrative that gives voice to a grief beyond words, Becker shows us ordinary people struggling to maintain their humanity and dignity. Vennewitz's translation conveys the restraint and emotional power of a story that unfolds with the impact of a moral parable or a folk legend.
Copyright 1996 Reed Business Information, Inc.

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 240 pages
• Publisher: Arcade Publishing; First U.S. Edition edition (February 7, 1996)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1559703156
• ISBN-13: 978-1559703154
• Product Dimensions: 8.6 x 5.8 x 1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 15.2 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (5 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #996,423 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

13 of 13 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Lies and Hope during the Holocaust, November 10, 1998

By A Customer

This review is from: Jacob the Liar (Paperback)

The role of "fiction" in the midst of horror so stark it cannot be endured: this is the central premise of Jurek Becker's holocaust novel Jacob the Liar. Jacob Haym, a prisoner in a Jewish ghetto toward the end of World War Two, is mistakenly caught out after curfew, and ordered to the camp office. While there, he overhears a radio report that the Russian army is nearby; amazingly, the camp officials allow him to return to the ghetto. When he tells the others what he has heard -- that salvation is perhaps 300 miles away -- no one believes him until he makes up the lie that he has a secret radio (Possession of a radio by ghetto inhabitants was a serious infraction, punishable by death). This single ray of hope, though, is not enough for his neighbors and co-workers; since Jacob has a radio, surely he can give them more frequent updates. Hence, Jacob becomes a "liar", inventing radio reports of the war coming ever closer to the camp, and with its approach the promise of salvation. The role of hope in the midst of seeming hopelessness is central to Becker's stark novel. Jacob tries to "give up" his lies several times, but discovers that the community has come to depend on him. With the advent of his radio reports, suicides in the ghetto have stopped. A different "spirit" is in the community. If Jacob stops his wholly fictionalized "radio" reports, the former hopelessness would return. What is better: a pleasant lie or unblinking verity? Becker's novel does not make for happy reading. Hope, in the end, was a chimera. Nonetheless, this is a magnificent book, and worthy of wide readership. Becker's characters -- every one of them -- is fully drawn, and believable. One truly feels Jacob's dilemma, and his absolute frustration with the role of "sage" he has unwittingly thrust upon himself. The book jacket indicates the book has been made into a movie -- I will be looking for the film at our local video store.

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A touching Act of Kindness, April 29, 2000

By 

"maxsteel" - See all my reviews

This review is from: Jacob the Liar (Hardcover)

"JACOB THE LIAR," by Jurek Becker is a good example of how humane a person can be despite the place and situation that he/she is found. In this case is inside the ghetto, where Jacob Heym, a jew prisoner of the Germans accidentally overheard the news of a German radio saying, "troops succeeded in halting the Bolshevist attack 12 miles from Bezenika." He spread the news with the good intention of bringing hope and faith to the abandoned people there. And to stop the suicides that were committed due to the desperation of no help. Unfortunately, time past and nothing happened until one day someone betrayed them and went with the Germans, who immediately responded to this in search of the imaginary radio. The book is great as the movie, except that imagination plays a big role here so stop wasting time and check it out.

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Just read it, February 15, 2006

By 

Sophia d. (New England) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Jakob the Liar (Paperback)

You won't regret the time or money spent on this book. Just read it. AFTER you've read the book, watch the movie. Robin Williams is a master. There's not much more I can say, because once you experience this tale for yourself, you won't need someone else's words to describe it.