Itemize Books Toward My Name Is Asher Lev (Asher Lev #1)
| Original Title: | My Name Is Asher Lev |
| ISBN: | 1400031044 (ISBN13: 9781400031047) |
| Edition Language: | English |
| Series: | Asher Lev #1 |
| Setting: | United States of America |
Chaim Potok
Paperback | Pages: 369 pages Rating: 4.21 | 34989 Users | 2644 Reviews
Identify About Books My Name Is Asher Lev (Asher Lev #1)
| Title | : | My Name Is Asher Lev (Asher Lev #1) |
| Author | : | Chaim Potok |
| Book Format | : | Paperback |
| Book Edition | : | Special Edition |
| Pages | : | Pages: 369 pages |
| Published | : | March 11th 2003 by Anchor (first published 1972) |
| Categories | : | Fiction. Classics |
Representaion During Books My Name Is Asher Lev (Asher Lev #1)
Asher Lev is a Ladover Hasid who keeps kosher, prays three times a day and believes in the Ribbono Shel Olom, the Master of the Universe. Asher Lev is an artist who is compulsively driven to render the world he sees and feels even when it leads him to blasphemy. In this stirring and often visionary novel, Chaim Potok traces Asher’s passage between these two identities, the one consecrated to God, the other subject only to the imagination. Asher Lev grows up in a cloistered Hasidic community in postwar Brooklyn, a world suffused by ritual and revolving around a charismatic Rebbe. But in time his gift threatens to estrange him from that world and the parents he adores. As it follows his struggle, My Name Is Asher Lev becomes a luminous portrait of the artist, by turns heartbreaking and exultant, a modern classic.Rating About Books My Name Is Asher Lev (Asher Lev #1)
Ratings: 4.21 From 34989 Users | 2644 ReviewsAssessment About Books My Name Is Asher Lev (Asher Lev #1)
4.5 starsChaim Potok's writing is quite remarkable! Being a rabbi, Potok's works would explore the lives of Hasidic and Orthodox Jewish subjects and their struggles, but often, these struggles took place internally or within their religious community as opposed to taking place in their exterior world. My Name Is Asher Lev is a prime example of the central character's very own struggle. Within a religion that is grounded, is filled with rules, and requires a lot from its followers, Asher sees aMy Name is Asher Lev is about, at its heart, "the unspeakable mystery that brings good fathers and sons into the world and lets a mother watch them tear at each other's throats." It depicts that unspeakable mystery in all its painful humanity, and as a consequence the book is moving and disturbing. Asher Lev is a Hasidic Jew who has a gift for painting, a "foolishness" his father cannot understand. Potok could have turned Asher's father into a villain; instead he makes him human and sympathetic.
My Name is Asher Lev is about, at its heart, "the unspeakable mystery that brings good fathers and sons into the world and lets a mother watch them tear at each other's throats." It depicts that unspeakable mystery in all its painful humanity, and as a consequence the book is moving and disturbing. Asher Lev is a Hasidic Jew who has a gift for painting, a "foolishness" his father cannot understand. Potok could have turned Asher's father into a villain; instead he makes him human and sympathetic.
The Absence of ItalicsI returned to reread this classic after reading Talia Carner's recent novel Jerusalem Maiden, since the protagonists of both are talented artists raised within Orthodox Judaism, struggling to reconcile their art to their faith. To succeed, the writers must convey the nature of both religious belief and artistic inspiration, a challenge that Potok meets brilliantly. Consider one significant example. Both novels are full of Hebrew wordsShabbos, Rosh Hadesh, Krias Shema,
Appeal: I cannot find the words to explain the appeal of this book. I find it terribly ironic that I finished it today, on Easter, the holiest day of the year for me as a fervent Christian. Comments: This book is buzzing around in my head; it feels too fresh for me to write any clear thoughts about why it was so powerful. All I can say is to read this book for yourself. But be careful if you do; it is not a book to be read lightly.
Powerful. This is the story of a Hasidic Jew who is a gifted painter, a talent not approved of among orthodox Jews. His life becomes a struggle between his father--who tries to stir him away from the arts to more traditionally accepted hobbies all the while trying to understand him--and his need to draw to express himself. I could sympathize with all the characters in the book: his father for trying to hold onto his religious convictions without dominance but love, his mother for trying to love
Let me preface this review by stating that I have little basis for identifying with many characters in the book: I am not Jewish, was not raised in a religious community, did not see my community nearly exterminated during the worst conflict in the 20th century, and couldn't draw a properly proportioned stick figure to save my life. In spite of all of these obstacles I found this book both challenging and emotionally compelling.This book raises many questions: what does it mean to be an artist?
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