Belonging: The Story of the Jews 1492–1900 - Softcover

Schama CBE, Simon

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1847922813 ISBN 13: 9781847922816

Publisher: Bodley Head, 2017

Synopsis

LONGLISTED FOR THE BAILLIE GIFFORD PRIZE

The Jewish story is a history that is about, and for, all of us. And in our own time of anxious arrivals and enforced departures, the Jews’ search for a home is more startlingly resonant than ever.

Belonging is a magnificent cultural history abundantly alive with energy, character and colour. It spans centuries and continents, from the Jews’ expulsion from Spain in 1492 it navigates miracles and massacres, wandering, discrimination, harmony and tolerance; to the brink of the twentieth century and, it seems, a point of profound hope.

It tells the stories not just of rabbis and philosophers but of a poetess in the ghetto of Venice; a boxer in Georgian England; a general in Ming China; an opera composer in nineteenth-century Germany. The story unfolds in Kerala and Mantua, the starlit hills of Galilee, the rivers of Colombia, the kitchens of Istanbul, the taverns of Ukraine and the mining camps of California. It sails in caravels, rides the stage coaches and the railways; trudges the dawn streets of London, hobbles along with the remnant of Napoleon’s ruined army.

Through Schama’s passionate telling of this second chronicle in an epic tale, a history emerges of the Jewish people that feels it is the story of everyone, of humanity.

About this title

Review:

"Simon Schama takes the reader through a grand sweep of Jewish history, but he makes it so personal you begin to feel you know the men and women whose lives shine out from the pages, and their foibles, and you get a sense of the fragility of their lives and their determination to survive. It's a brilliant piece of work" (Julia Neuberger, Senior Rabbi, West London Synagogue)

Book Description:

Here is a passionate history of a world unfolding across many continents and five centuries by one of our greatest and internationally bestselling historians.

About this edition

• Publisher: Bodley Head
• Publication date: 2017
• ISBN 10: 1847922813
• ISBN 13: 9781847922816
• Binding: Paperback
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 800