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trilby001 's review for:
The Invisible Wall
by Harry Bernstein
This memoir is a real tear-jerker, and when I say "real," I mean it. This is a powerful and moving true story. At the age of 93, Harry Bernstein wrote down his recollections of growing up in a working-class Midlands neighborhood. One side of the street was Christian, the other Jewish. The complete lack of understanding or empathy on both sides of the street is appalling. These people's minds were closed tighter than a drum.
Bernstein's story is a kind of Jewish "Angela's Ashes" giving insight into the poverty, brutality, drunkenness and violence afflicting these families. In at least one way,however, the McCourt family had it better than the Bernsteins: their father ran off, while Harry's father stayed and made everyone's life a living hell. Like "Ashes," "Wall" has its humorous moments, but they are funny in a characteristically Jewish way--self-deprecating, ironic, verbal.
The reader has the Lancashire accent of the major characters down pat...the problem being that many of these people were immigrants from Eastern Europe. I understand,however, that it would be difficult and confusing to try to make all the accents sound authentic. All in all, the audio text is performed well.
Bernstein's story is a kind of Jewish "Angela's Ashes" giving insight into the poverty, brutality, drunkenness and violence afflicting these families. In at least one way,however, the McCourt family had it better than the Bernsteins: their father ran off, while Harry's father stayed and made everyone's life a living hell. Like "Ashes," "Wall" has its humorous moments, but they are funny in a characteristically Jewish way--self-deprecating, ironic, verbal.
The reader has the Lancashire accent of the major characters down pat...the problem being that many of these people were immigrants from Eastern Europe. I understand,however, that it would be difficult and confusing to try to make all the accents sound authentic. All in all, the audio text is performed well.