I’ve intended to read Ozick for many years and finally have done so, thanks to a browse at the Cambridge Public Library which displayed this slim volume in its New Fiction shelf.  The writing was powerful, and the story was interesting, but I’m left somewhat puzzled by the intended ‘take home message’.

The story takes place in 1949 when Lloyd Wilkinson Petrie begins to write his 10 page memoir about the Temple Academy for Boys, an institution of which he is one of the seven remaining trustees.  The Academy closed in 1915 and Petrie along with the other trustees now lives in the repurposed buildings on the Westchester campus.  They decide to write an addendum to the history of the Academy, last written 30 years ago, and in the course of the writing, old wounds are opened, one Trustee dies after a fall, and another commits suicide.  As Petrie looks back, we learn about his relationship with Ben-Zion Elephantin, a strange fellow student who appears to embody alienation and marginalization, both at the Academy and within the world of Judaism and whom Petrie befriends though haltingly and with grave misgivings.

The anti-semitism that is taken for granted in the Academy of the early 20th C. persists into the 1940’s, even after WWII and the Holocaust, and seems to be the primary focus of Ozick’s novel.  There are other human failings highlighted as well—unhappy marriages, unrequited love, self interest bordering on criminality, petty squabbles, etc.  Not a happy view of mankind, but the 93 year old Ozick has had a lot to deal with over the years.

Don’t pick this book up if you’re looking for light reading, but if you’re not familiar with Ozick, it’s a fine introduction to her beautiful writing and her enigmatic view of man.