Half-Jew: A Daughter's Search For Her Family's Buried Past

by Susan Jacoby

A journalist journeys back into her family's own hidden past to uncover the history of her New York German-Jewish family, which attempted to hide its religious and cultural background by converting to Roman Catholicism.

Genres: Memoir

304 pages, Hardcover

First published May 5, 2000

About the author

Susan Jacoby is an independent scholar and best-selling author. The most recent of her seven previous books is The Age of American Unreason. She lives in New York City.

Reviews

[Jan Rice · Rating 5 out of 5]

I can't remember how I came across this book, an old one from 2000. I'm guessing that in the last couple of years I read something else by the journalist and writer Susan Jacoby, or something about her, and looked her up. Then, just recently, I read a book review by her and on an impulse went on and ordered her book. It's almost a shame not to order since so many are available used for a pittance, but--watch out--can make for alarming queues of books around the house. This one, though, broke in line, and I read it without further ado.

Despite the title, the book is only secondarily about a "half-Jew"--a category some will tell you can't exist since they are thinking of "Jew" as a religion, but it can exist, considering "Jew" has an ethnic as well as a religious connotation.

What the book is primarily about is how the author's Jewish forebears--her father's side being the Jewish side--concealed their origins: why they did so, the times and social context in which they did so, and its impact.

Partly it was the new wave of "overly-Jewish" Jews emanating from Eastern Europe, threatening the perceived acceptance of the German Jews who had arrived earlier. Prior to WWI, Germans had been a category of Europeans who were well received in America.

But mainly it was that they were Jews. Although racism has been called the original sin of America, anti-Judaism is arguably the original sin of Christianity, and we're talking about a time period in which the WASP hegemony over America intensified--from the end of the nineteenth century through WWII and the '50s.

Although the book focuses on the shenanigans and foibles of Susan Jacoby's Jewish ancestors, one incident in particular shows how the phenomenon of anti-Judaism she is describing is reflected in the society as a whole: her warm, competent and even-keeled Irish Catholic mother lightened her hair from childhood, even though in those times peroxide was considered risque. Thus she was given a "less-Jewish" appearance. Her maternal grandparents later acknowledged that at the time they, too, thought concealing her Jewish origins was for the best.

Susan Jacoby suggests a useful way of bringing the seemingly distant past closer: think not in years but in generations. Accordingly, my grandparents, all four of them born in the distant 1880s, have grandchildren, great grandchildren, and great great grandchildren alive and walking the earth as I write.

The last part of the book, in which she talks about conversion and the experiences of various other personages and authors was emotional for me, not because I'm a "half-Jew," which I am not, but because she's talking frankly about that which couldn't be spoken about in my life and my experience. I have thought about whether I would have pulled my head out of the figurative sand sooner if I'd lived in a place and time in which I was called "Jew-baby," etc., rather than the smothering cloud of cotton-like silence that prevailed. I only woke up when I was around 60, as a result of attending a church with my Protestant husband where they taught anti-Israel downstairs and anti-Judaism upstairs--not that they knew what they were doing (it was just part of the wallpaper). Unknowingly I had signed onto a life-long social contract of silence, yet behind church doors they weren't silent, so it was a deal-breaker.

Susan Jacoby and I are the same age, so even though this book was published nearly two decades ago, we were both in our mid-fifties at the time.

One more thing: We live in a call-out culture, and a lot is being written these days in which people are judged for how they were in the past. And while people excoriate each other for these alleged sins of past wrong-thinking and wrong-speaking and -living, those who are much, much worse--shameless--keep right on doing their thing. Yes, I'm getting political. Think Trump. We should stop expending our energies on a hopeless search for perfection and purity. Everybody thought certain ways in the past because of the culture in which they were pickled. Few are guilty but we all are responsible. Let's move on.

Needless to say after that little diatribe, this book is not a condemnation of the past but the exercise of someone who is freeing herself for the present and future.

[Robert Dudley · Rating 5 out of 5]

A truly wonderful book, part history of the Jacoby family and anti antisemitism both in the United States and Europe from the middle of 1800s to the 1950s. It is also a biography of Ms. Jacoby's father and and her personal story of her relationship with her father and her family.

Antisemitism has been an issue for many centuries and Ms Jacoby traces it history in unflinching terms. While it is not as overt today, there is a strong covert strain virulent today in the united States. Ms Jacoby discusses the ramifications of antisemitism on the the Jews (negative) ; not only upon the original victims but also their children and grandchildren. We see similarities when one considers the impact of 400 years of oppression of blacks and other people of colour. What is also buried in this book is the treatment of women, especially woman married to Jewish men. It is a very complex topic and the box would be many times longer if Ms Jacoby drilled down deeper in this topic.

Despite the subject, especially the often prickly with her father, there is a remembrance of the good times with many humorous antidotes. Ms Jacoby's relationship with her father was complex yet she has a lot of empathy for him for, after all, it is a story of love.

[Abigail G · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book was a lot of history but since the author kept it in context of her family it was more relatable. The writing format made it so I did not become attached to any of the people in the book, rather I feel like I just gained information on dates and societal shifts. There are many things that my generation cannot imagine as ever being acceptable to society that this book manages to explain clearly about how the Jewish people were treated. The last few chapters were the most enjoyable to me as she shared her personal views on what being a half-Jew really was.

[Laura Boudreau · Rating 4 out of 5]

Very good read about the effects of assimilation on an American Jewish family

[Alan · Rating 3 out of 5]

Susan Jacoby is the author of one of my favorite books - the Age of American Unreason - and is too good a writer to write a bad book. This book, Half-Jew, tells the story of her father's side of the family, especially that of her father who converted to Catholicism when he was married and raised Susan that way even though the Jacoby family had a rich Jewish heritage. There were far too many family details in this book for me but I was interested to learn that Susan's uncle was Oswald Jacoby, the famous bridge player whose books I read when I was learning to play that game. A key point that Jacoby explores is why when Jews convert to Christianity they often feel a sense of betrayal to the Jews in history who suffered very cruel and long-lasting persecution. Jacoby concludes that one cannot be both a Jew and a Christian, which makes being a Half-Jew very problematic.

[Kirsten · Rating 3 out of 5]

I was fascinated by this, but it also dragged on way too long. But it was incredibly thought-provoking, especially as a half-Jew, and particularly as a genealogist. Our Jewish families had many many things in common, including the city they immigrated from (Breslau, now Wroclaw), the increasing secularization in America and loss of Jewish identity, estranged brothers - the major difference was that no one in my family tried to hide their Jewishness (just let it slip into oblivion). But the book does go off on a few too many tangents, particularly near the end, and it took forever to finish it.

[Marge · Rating 5 out of 5]

A beautifully written memoir analyzing why the author's family kept their Jewish heritage a secret. Jacoby is a wonderful writer.

[Rowena James · Rating 1 out of 5]

Repetitive

[Susan · Rating 4 out of 5]

very good, personal story, well written, interesting