Malamud, Bernard (Vol. 2) - Malamud, Bernard 1914–

Malamud, Bernard 1914–

Malamud, a Jewish-American novelist and short story writer, is the author of The Fixer, Pictures of Fidelman, and The Tenants. (See also Contemporary Authors, Vols. 5-8, rev. ed.)

The theme of The Assistant is … mythical and is in fact the theme of all Malamud's novels to date. These novels are about the experience of re-birth; in each of them a prematurely oldish young man, whose earlier life is cloaked in darkness, but has included a dismal or tragic experience of failure, is given a second chance to make something of his life and redeem his disreputable past….

[Malamud] discovers Pilgrim's Progress in a grocery store, creates Jews who are dead-ringers for Christian saints, and finds the Chapel Perilous in Ebbetts Field. The wonders of nature never cease.

Steven Marcus, "The Novel Again," in Partisan Review (copyright © 1962 by Partisan Review,...

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