Foreskin's Lament - Softcover

Auslander, Shalom

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0330453548 ISBN 13: 9780330453547

Publisher: Picador, 2009

Synopsis

'America's hottest, funniest, most controversial young Jewish memoirist . . . blackly hilarious, groundbreaking' The Times

About this title

Review

About the Author ~ Shalom Auslander
Shalom Auslander was raised as an Orthodox Jew in Spring Valley, New York. His writing has been published in the New Yorker and Esquire, among other magazines. He lives in upstate New York with his wife and son.

Exclusive Amazon.co.uk Interview with Shalom Auslander

What is Foreskin's Lament about?

I was raised in a small ultra-Orthodox Jewish community in New York; picture a madrasa somewhere in Taliban Town, change the head coverings to yarmulkes, switch the Korans for Old Testaments and that’s pretty much it. The book is about my life under the thumb of an abusive, belligerent God, and the long-term emotionally crippling effects the fundamentalism of my youth has had and continues to have upon me. But funny. I suppose it didn’t help that my father on Earth was as abusive as my Father in Heaven. Good times, good times.

What inspired you to write it?

Anger. Four years ago, my wife and I went to a doctor, and the doctor put gel on my wife’s belly, and then the doctor said, "It’s a boy." And instead of being excited – instead of picking out little footballs or infant-sized Valentino Rossi shirts – I spent the evening terrified: Should I circumcise him or not? What will God do if I don’t? Will He kill me? Will He kill my son? Will He kill my son first, just so I experience that agony, and then kill me? When will He kill my wife? And then that fear turned to anger, and I thought, "Maybe I should write this down. Maybe I should tell someone what this feels like." And so I did.

Who are your literary influences?

I have no idea – I know who I like, I know who inspires me (Kafka, Beckett, Celine, Voltaire), but whether they influence my writing or not is for someone else to decide.

If you could recommend just one "must-read book" to anyone, what would it be and why?

I would recommend anything by me. This is because I’m self-centered, and broke.

What top tips do you have for anyone looking to write their first book?

Don’t. The only ones worth writing are the ones that tell the deepest, darkest truths about life and humanity, and the only way you can discover that is discover the deepest, darkest truths about yourself. Totally not worth it. Buy a flatscreen TV and an Xbox, stop looking inward and float through life, plump, shallow and happy. It will all be over soon, and you’ll thank me when it is.

Reviews for Foreskin's Lament

We are not the only ones to love this book. Check out a selection of reviews below.

Unforgettable . . . [Auslander is] America's hottest, funniest, most controversial young Jewish memoirist . . . I challenge even the most disapproving of his parents' friends to read this blackly hilarious, groundbreaking memoir without wiping tears of both kinds from their eyes. The Times

Outrageously funny . . . Dazzling . . . Raw brilliance infused with classic Jewish irony . . . This is indeed a lament, but a lament with attitude. Sunday Telegraph

Hilarious and devastating . . . Few books really are laugh-out-loud funny. This one is. The comic timing is perfect and, as with all the best Jewish jokes, the pain behind the humour is apparent . . . Fascinating. Naomi Alderman, Sunday Times

Review

"Shalom Auslander writes like Philip Roth's angry nephew. "Foreskin's Lament" is a scathing theological rant, a funny, oddly moving coming-of-age memoir, and an irreverent meditation on family, marriage, and cultural identity. God may be a bit irritated by this book, but I loved it." --Tom Perrotta, author of "Little Children" and "The Abstinence Teacher" "If you read this while you're eating, the food will come out your nose. "Foreskin's Lament" is a filthy and slightly troubling dialogue with God, the big, old, physically abusive ultra orthodox God who brought His Chosen People out of Egypt to torture them with non kosher Slim Jims. I loved this book and will never again look at the isolated religious nutjobs on the fringe of American society with anything less than love and understanding." -Matt Klam, author of "Sam the Cat" What was it that Tolstoy said about unhappy families? While each may in fact be unique in its discontent, surely the one recalled here by Auslander (Beware of God: Stories, 2005) stands out from the rest for sheer outlandish, operatic misery. Haunted by the ghost of a first son who died in toddler-hood, the author's Orthodox Jewish father became a broken, brutish alcoholic. His mother, an embittered woman convinced she married beneath her, lusted vocally after the achievements and wealth of her two brothers, both rabbis. This childhood tale of woe could be merely maudlin, but Auslander brings a mordant sense of humor to his portraits of encounters with the non-Orthodox and their Trans Ams, and of jockeying for position in his isolated upstate New York community. The book begins with the author, who fled this insular world to work in New York City, discoveringthat wife Orli, a fellow religious refugee, was pregnant-an occasion to celebrate for many, but Auslander, who grew up terrified of a vengeful God, saw it more like the setup to a cosmic joke. "I know this God, I know how he works," he writes. "On the drive home from the hospital, we'll collide head-on with a drunk driver and [my wife and son will] both die later... That would be so God." The author's attempts to rid himself of the scheming deity under whose thumb he came of age became tangled up in his strained relationship with his family, but he tells this sad story with a crucial touch of satire. In the midst of a description of his waking nightmares of theistic vengeance, a friend interrupted to point out that Auslander's conviction that God might have a personal vendetta against him was slightly solipsistic. He's scheming against you, too, Auslander responded: "You just don't notice it." An often breathtakingly irreverent look at religion and the humorous side of exorcising the past. --"Kirkus Reviews," August 1, 2007 aFierce, funny, and subversively heartfelt...With his middle finger pointed at the heavens and a hand held over his heart, Auslander gives us "Foreskinas Lament," Mazel tov to him. And God? Well, heall survive.a a"New York Times Book Review" aAuslander writes like Philip Rothas angry nephew... a scathing theological rant, a funny, oddly moving coming-of-age memoir, and an irreverent meditation on family, marriage, and cultural identity. God may be a bit irritated by this book, but I loved it.a aTom Perrotta, author of "Little Children" and "The Abstinence Teacher" aA laugh-out-loud quarrel with God.a a"Newsweek" aA terrific book I was sad I read in so few sittings, because I wanted more.a a"San Francisco Chronicle" aHilarious, caustic, and surprisingly moving.a a"Philadelphia Inquirer" aBlasphemous and funny.a a "Newsweek" aA surprise and delight.a a"Boston Globe" aA fretful, self-effacing, bittera]hilarious story.a a"The Houston Chronicle" aWryly comic.a a"New York Magazine" aHilarious, caustic, and surprisingly moving.a a"Philadelphia Inquirer" aA very funny memoir.a a"GQ" aLyrical, hystericala] funny and angry.a a"Cleveland Plain Dealer" aAn audacious, poke-God-in-theeye memoir.a a"Miami Herald"

About this edition

• Publisher: Picador
• Publication date: 2009
• ISBN 10: 0330453548
• ISBN 13: 9780330453547
• Binding: Paperback
• Language: English
• Number of pages: 321