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A review by incrediblemelk
The Boys from Brazil by Ira Levin
adventurous
challenging
dark
tense
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.5
This was a much less substantial read than I’d been expecting. It was very pacy and potboiling in tone, and was over very quickly.
I knew about this book culturally so its key idea was not a surprise to me. Perhaps that packed much more of a punch when it was originally published.
1976 was only four years on from the Munich massacre and there was a sense of attractiveness to the figure of a young, vigorous Jewish avenger. At the same time, it was 30 years on from WWII at a time when Nazis had become quaint, almost camp figures and the idea that they might still be conspiring in South American exile seemed the stuff of speculative fiction.
What I focused on were the ethical debates between Liebermann, the Holocaust survivor and Nazi hunter who is clearly modelled on Simon Wiesenthal, and Rabbi Moshe Gorin, head of the militant organisation Young Jewish Defenders, of whom Liebermann says, “Brown shirts are never good, no matter who’s wearing them.”
Gorin says he’d be willing, and even morally obliged, to kill a child if that child had the biological potential to grow up to become the next Hitler. Like the State of Israel treats a Palestinian child, Gorin sees a child’s essential identity, which the child cannot control or change, as always-already threatening; of course the irony is that such an attitude turns persecuted children into resistance fighters.
Meanwhile, Liebermann refocuses his mission to training kids to be anti-fascists: a social and cultural bulwark against the resurgence of Nazism. Is he naive? Has he put too much trust in human goodness? To me it’s honourable that he is not bitter, alienated or thirsty for extrajudicial revenge after surviving genocide himself.
Here’s the challenging thing: we don’t need shadowy conspiracies about biological clones of Hitler, raised in similar social conditions as Hitler, in order to experience a resurgence of fascism. We have seen far-right ideologies actually at work in the world: in Brazil and Argentina, in the US, in India and the Philippines, and of course in Israel. Fascism is returning to Europe, and its ideologies are largely tolerated by the Western and international institutions in which Liebermann puts all his faith in justice.
Not to sound too much like Tina Turner in ‘Mad Max: Beyond Thunderdome’, but we don’t need another Hitler. He has lost his power as a unique symbol of human evil when a nation established by his opponents and his victims can replicate his crimes in unnerving detail and with impunity.
I knew about this book culturally so its key idea was not a surprise to me. Perhaps that packed much more of a punch when it was originally published.
1976 was only four years on from the Munich massacre and there was a sense of attractiveness to the figure of a young, vigorous Jewish avenger. At the same time, it was 30 years on from WWII at a time when Nazis had become quaint, almost camp figures and the idea that they might still be conspiring in South American exile seemed the stuff of speculative fiction.
What I focused on were the ethical debates between Liebermann, the Holocaust survivor and Nazi hunter who is clearly modelled on Simon Wiesenthal, and Rabbi Moshe Gorin, head of the militant organisation Young Jewish Defenders, of whom Liebermann says, “Brown shirts are never good, no matter who’s wearing them.”
Gorin says he’d be willing, and even morally obliged, to kill a child if that child had the biological potential to grow up to become the next Hitler. Like the State of Israel treats a Palestinian child, Gorin sees a child’s essential identity, which the child cannot control or change, as always-already threatening; of course the irony is that such an attitude turns persecuted children into resistance fighters.
Meanwhile, Liebermann refocuses his mission to training kids to be anti-fascists: a social and cultural bulwark against the resurgence of Nazism. Is he naive? Has he put too much trust in human goodness? To me it’s honourable that he is not bitter, alienated or thirsty for extrajudicial revenge after surviving genocide himself.
Here’s the challenging thing: we don’t need shadowy conspiracies about biological clones of Hitler, raised in similar social conditions as Hitler, in order to experience a resurgence of fascism. We have seen far-right ideologies actually at work in the world: in Brazil and Argentina, in the US, in India and the Philippines, and of course in Israel. Fascism is returning to Europe, and its ideologies are largely tolerated by the Western and international institutions in which Liebermann puts all his faith in justice.
Not to sound too much like Tina Turner in ‘Mad Max: Beyond Thunderdome’, but we don’t need another Hitler. He has lost his power as a unique symbol of human evil when a nation established by his opponents and his victims can replicate his crimes in unnerving detail and with impunity.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Animal death, Death, Gun violence, Blood, Antisemitism, Religious bigotry, Death of parent, Murder, and Injury/Injury detail
Moderate: Hate crime and War