
People Love Dead Jews
Reports from a Haunted Present
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Narrated by:
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Xe Sands
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By:
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Dara Horn
A startling and profound exploration of how Jewish history is exploited to comfort the living.
Renowned and beloved as a prizewinning novelist, Dara Horn has also been publishing penetrating essays since she was a teenager. Often asked by major publications to write on subjects related to Jewish culture - and increasingly in response to a recent wave of deadly anti-Semitic attacks - Horn was troubled to realize what all of these assignments had in common: She was being asked to write about dead Jews, never about living ones. In these essays, Horn reflects on subjects as far-flung as the international veneration of Anne Frank, the mythology that Jewish family names were changed at Ellis Island, the blockbuster traveling exhibition Auschwitz, the marketing of the Jewish history of Harbin, China, and the little-known life of the "righteous Gentile" Varian Fry. Throughout, she challenges us to confront the reasons why there might be so much fascination with Jewish deaths, and so little respect for Jewish lives unfolding in the present.
Horn draws upon her travels, her research, and also her own family life - trying to explain Shakespeare’s Shylock to a curious 10-year-old, her anger when swastikas are drawn on desks in her children’s school, the profound perspective offered by traditional religious practice and study - to assert the vitality, complexity, and depth of Jewish life against an anti-Semitism that, far from being disarmed by the mantra of "Never forget", is on the rise. As Horn explores the (not so) shocking attacks on the American Jewish community in recent years, she reveals the subtler dehumanization built into the public piety that surrounds the Jewish past - making the radical argument that the benign reverence we give to past horrors is itself a profound affront to human dignity.
©2021 Dara Horn (P)2021 Recorded BooksListeners also enjoyed...




















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Magnificent
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Should be required reading
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Incredibly important book
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Moving. Eye opening. Convicting. Incredibly engaging.
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Sands’ reading, too, is superb.
Stunning book
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great book
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The material in her stories it’s sometimes hard to read or hard to hear because the crimes are so unbelievable and the imagery will stick with you forever.
I believe that this book should be read by all young adults and college students.
Powerful and thoughtful book with wonderful writing
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Interesting insights
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It's insightful, and and DOES raise the question, "[why do] people love dead Jews?" I have seen a few reviews of this book – actually, one review posted in two places, Goodreads and Audible, and it comes to the conclusion that "the benign reverence we give to past horrors is itself a profound affront to human dignity." I, however, sum it up with a different quote from the book: "Dead Jews are only worth discussing if they are part of something bigger."
A great part of the richness of Judaism is pointed out by that statement, and the current and past trends to anti-Semitism and the fact that the religion and our people ARE remembered and recognized in our dead. Our book club is planning to read this book as our choice in September, and I am looking forward to it and look forward to discussing it, both with the people in the book club and, perhaps, our Rabbi and Cantor, as well as the woman who responded to me (I won't state her name here, because she is not specifically asked me to or granted permission) when i suggested the book upon reading about it. The view of the world and anti-Semitism and how it remembers any and all Jewish people is both telling and thought-provoking.
People DO love dead Jews, but there is more to it
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Excellent book
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