The Invisible Wall - Hardcover

Bernstein, Harry

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0091795435 ISBN 13: 9780091795436

Publisher: Hutchinson, 2007

Synopsis

The narrow street on which Harry Bernstein grew up was seemingly unremarkable; there was nothing to distinguish it from the hundreds of other such working class streets in the industrial north of England - save for an invisible wall down the middle, dividing Jews on one side, from Christians on the other. The geographical distance may have been a couple of yards, but socially, it was miles. But there are few rules or unwritten laws that are not broken when circumstances demand, and few distances that are not too great to be travelled; and such was the case on our street. And I was to play an important part, unwittingly, in what happened. "The Invisible Wall" is the enchanting, true story of Harry's childhood in the mill town of Stockport in the shadow of the First World War. It's a wonderfully charming - and powerfully moving - tale of working class life, of social divide and of forbidden love.

About this title

Review:

" Harry Bernstein returns home and, magically, takes us with him. With its dancing prose and captivating descriptions of neighborhood life, we experience with the child Harry all the wonder, thrill, and heartbreak of being a working-class kid learning to navigate the balkanized world of Christians and Jews within a single English mill town. Bernstein gives us a people' s history, a street-level perspective on a world that might otherwise have been lost, with crucial lessons that will endure throughout time."
- Michael Patrick MacDonald, author of All Souls
" [An] affecting debut memoir . . . When major world events touch the poverty-stricken block, the individual coming-of-age story is intensified without being trivialized, and the conversational account takes on the heft of a historical novel with stirring success."
- Publisher' s Weekly (starred review)

"From the Hardcover edition."

"Harry Bernstein returns home and, magically, takes us with him. With its dancing prose and captivating descriptions of neighborhood life, we experience with the child Harry all the wonder, thrill, and heartbreak of being a working-class kid learning to navigate the balkanized world of Christians and Jews within a single English mill town. Bernstein gives us a people's history, a street-level perspective on a world that might otherwise have been lost, with crucial lessons that will endure throughout time."
-Michael Patrick MacDonald, author of All Souls

"[An] affecting debut memoir . . . When major world events touch the poverty-stricken block, the individual coming-of-age story is intensified without being trivialized, and the conversational account takes on the heft of a historical novel with stirring success."
-Publisher's Weekly (starred review)

From the Hardcover edition.

Book Description:

An extraordinary portrait of a lost world - powerful, moving and utterly unforgettable...

About this edition

• Publisher: Hutchinson
• Publication date: 2007
• ISBN 10: 0091795435
• ISBN 13: 9780091795436
• Binding: Hardcover
• Number of pages: 336