Malamud, Bernard (Vol. 8) | Malamud, Bernard 1914–
Malamud, Bernard 1914–
An American novelist and short story writer, Malamud employs his Jewish heritage to explore the themes of sin, suffering, and redemption. His style is characterized by the imaginative, mystical, and symbolic, and is reflective of his moral optimism. In 1959 Malamud won the National Book Award and in 1967 received his second National Book Award and the Pulitzer Prize. (See also CLC, Vols. 1, 2, 3, 5, and Contemporary Authors, Vols. 5-8, rev. ed.)
The Assistant, like Crime and Punishment, is a novel of guilt and expiation. The nature of both Frank Alpine's crime and his final redemption are of course different from Raskolnikov's, and it is in this difference that one of Malamud's major social criticisms can be discerned. For at the end of the novel, despite the fact that his crime is smaller and his attempt at expiation far more tangible than anything Raskolnikov achieves prior to confession, Frank...
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