The Judges [Hardcover]

Elie Wiesel (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: August 20, 2002

From Elie Wiesel, a gripping novel of guilt, innocence, and the perilousness of judging both.

A plane en route from New York to Tel Aviv is forced down by bad weather. A nearby house provides refuge for five of its passengers: Claudia, who has left her husband and found new love; Razziel, a religious teacher who was once a political prisoner; Yoav, a terminally ill Israeli commando; George, an archivist who is hiding a Holocaust secret that could bring down a certain politician; and Bruce, a would-be priest turned philanderer.

Their host—an enigmatic and disquieting man who calls himself simply the Judge—begins to interrogate them, forcing them to face the truth and meaning of their lives. Soon he announces that one of them—the least worthy—will die.

The Judges is a powerful novel that reflects the philosophical, religious, and moral questions that are at the heart of Elie Wiesel’s work.

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

Distinguished author, Holocaust survivor, and Nobel Peace Prize winner Elie Wiesel continues his exploration of guilt, innocence, history, and memory, but with a new twist. Wiesel moves the battle for the human soul from the Holocaust to the rarefied setting of a Connecticut parlor. There, five strangers, stranded during a snowstorm, find themselves manipulated by a sadistic host who calls himself the Judge and declares that one of them will die before morning. Through the long night, the characters take stock of their lives and indentify what inspires them to cling to life. There is George, the archivist who has discovered a dangerously revealing document and whose "ambition it is to evoke the memory of memory"; Yoav, the Israeli commando who believes that "each man was his own executioner and his own victim"; and Razziel, who lost the memory of his childhood to torturers and was on his way to meet the man who could unlock his past. While the characterizations are uneven (Bruce, the playboy, is stock stuff and the Judge's deification of evil is not entirely convincing), Wiesel's philosophical fable is powerful and thought provoking, and increasingly relevant in an age concerned with terrorism and the questions of good and evil. --Lesley Reed

From Publishers Weekly

There are two strains in Nobel Peace Prize-winner Wiesel's work. One is testimonial. Beginning with his classic, Night, Wiesel has made himself one of the great witnesses of our time. The other strain derives from Wiesel's fascination with parables and fables. In the 1950s, when Wiesel became known, the allegorical mode (suitably fitted out with existential meanings, as in Sartre's No Exit) enjoyed a brief vogue. His latest novel even refers to Sartre's play as it portrays a sort of metaphysical hostage taking. A plane bound from New York to Israel is forced to land in a snowstorm in Connecticut, and five passengers are taken to the house of a local man who has the delusion that he is a judge in a capital case. As the guests respond to the judges more and more personal and insinuating questions, their characters are revealed. Claudia, a pretty theater press agent, wants to get out of the situation by complying; Bruce, a self-described playboy, opts for childish defiance. George, an archivist, and Yoav, an Israeli soldier, respond in more restrained ways. The most thoughtful figure, Razziel, is the principal of a yeshiva. His impressions provide the frame of the drama. Each character, caught in the facts of his or her past and oriented toward future projects, must confront a present threat that crystallizes their existences. Wiesel is obviously closest to Razziel, whose past experiences in a Romanian prison and interest in mysticism mirror, in lightly fictionalized form, factors in Wiesels own life. There is a certain creakiness about the plot, reminiscent less of Sartre than of the Twilight Zone; the story seems more suited to the stage than the novel form. However, the authority of Wiesel's public persona always invests his writings with interest.
Copyright 2002 Reed Business Information, Inc.

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 224 pages
• Publisher: Knopf; 1st American ed edition (August 20, 2002)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0375409092
• ISBN-13: 978-0375409097
• Product Dimensions: 8.6 x 5.9 x 0.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 14.2 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 3.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (6 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,410,297 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Elie Wiesel is the author of more than forty books, including his unforgettable international best sellers Night and A Beggar in Jerusalem, winner of the Prix Médicis. He has been awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the United States Congressional Gold Medal, and the French Legion of Honor with the rank of Grand Cross. In 1986, he received the Nobel Peace Prize. He is Andrew W. Mellon Professor in the Humanities and University Professor at Boston University.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

21 of 22 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars A cryptic novel that explores the value of a life., August 24, 2002

By 

E. Bukowsky "booklover10" (NY United States) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: The Judges (Hardcover)

In Elie Wiesel's novel, "The Judges," five airline travelers are flying en route from New York to Tel Aviv. They are forced to land in Connecticut because of a severe snowstorm. An apparently hospitable individual invites them to stay in his cabin until the storm subsides. What the five passengers do not know is that their apparently kind-hearted host has a hidden agenda that is anything but benign.

The travelers, four men and a woman, have secrets and worries that plague them. One of them is terminally ill, another seeks to regain memories of his earlier life, and a third carries a letter that may have serious political ramifications. The host, who calls himself "The Judge," starts to play a malevolent game with his guests. He cruelly informs them that after they reveal the intimate details of their lives, the least worthy among them will die. Also in the cabin is the Hunchback, the Judge's servant, who is a severely deformed man that the Judge took in when no one else would care for him. The Hunchback has secret thoughts of his own that he keeps carefully hidden.

This slim novel (approximately 200 pages long) is filled with convoluted philosophical musings. The travelers engage in verbal sparring matches with one another and with the Judge. Unfortunately, none of the characters come to life, and it is unclear what the Judge, the Hunchback and the travelers are supposed to represent. What is Wiesel trying to say about the significance of an individual's life? I was unable to detect a coherent message in this novel. After having read Wiesel's touching and deeply meaningful works on the Holocaust, I was surprised by how unmoved "The Judges" left me.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars excellent book, March 20, 2006

A Kid's Review

This review is from: The Judges (Hardcover)

first of all, i am not a kid, i am simply a person without a bunch of time floating around to fill out all that crap simply to write a review. second, this book was utterly facsinating and i was genuinly disappointed when i came to its end. i love how real elie wiesel makes his characters and really enoyed getting to know the five passengers as well as the judge and his little hunchback. a great read for anyone not afraid to think.

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Found Wanting, February 24, 2007

By 

R. Chaffey "beckahi" (Chicago) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: The Judges: A Novel (Paperback)

Through numerous novels, Elie Wiesel has proven himself to be a master storyteller. He is able to intermingle the fictional world with the all too real memories of the Holocaust that haunt almost every piece of writing he produces. While "The Judges" has an intriguing premise, it is not among his better works.

When a plane en route to Tel Aviv is forced down by a snow storm, five random passengers find themselves offered refuge in a nearby house. What at first appears to be a safe haven quickly turns into a nightmare when the host, who simply refers to himself as the Judge, tells them of the 'game' at hand. All five of those present will be judged and the one who is the least worthy among them must pay the ultimate sacrifice. The five strangers have trouble believing the Judge at first, simply thinking his pronouncement a farce, but when they discover that they are locked within the room, they quickly realize the seriousness of their predicament. They must try to work together to fight their way out, or decide who should be the sacrificial lamb for the others.

"The Judges" has many characteristics that trademark a Wiesel novel. There is the shift in narrative between various characters, and between past and present times. Yet unlike his other works, the narratives here have little cohesiveness - there is no thread that ties them all together and even though the five characters are forced to spend one night together under one roof, that is all that unites them. There may be commonalities among their pasts and their reasons for wishing to remain alive, but beyond that, this story is about disconnect. The ending is far too rushed for the story that is offered and the conclusion to the host's 'game' is trite and predictable. With that being said, "The Judges" is still a fine read, thanks in large part to Wiesel's intellect and his poetic use of language.