Confronting the Holocaust: The impact of Elie Wiesel

by Alvin H. Rosenfeld, Irving Greenberg

"while Kafka seems to embody elements of all of these, he simultaneously transcends them"

239 pages, Hardcover

First published February 1, 1978

About the author

Alvin H. Rosenfeld, Professor of English and Jewish Studies at Indiana University, Bloomington, received his Ph.D. from Brown University in 1967 and has taught at Indiana University since 1968. He holds the Irving M. Glazer Chair in Jewish Studies and is Director of the university’s Institute for the Study of Contemporary Antisemitism. He founded Indiana University's well-regarded Borns Jewish Studies Program and served as its director for 30 years. He has been honored with Indiana University Distinguished Service Award and also the Provost’s Medal “in recognition of sustained academic excellence, vision, and leadership resulting in lasting and widespread impact.” In 2019, he received the President’s Medal, Indiana University’s highest award, “in recognition of sustained excellence in service, achievement, and leadership.”

Reviews

[Jeff · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book probably won't be of much interest to you unless you are either a Holocaust scholar or fan of Elie Wiesel. This collection of essays from Holocaust scholars approaches Wiesel's work from a variety of angles - the literary, the spiritual, the historical, and others. Particularly intriguing are the essays which place Wiesel in the context of the Midrash. Wiesel himself gets the final say in the collection with "Why I Write," in which he speaks eloquently and determinedly about the obligation he owes the dead to bear witness.