I was surprised to see so few reviews for this book on Amazon. "The Reawakening" is one of the great works of literature of the 20th century - and one of the most enjoyable. Levi's "Survival in Auschwitz" is a good book, and obviously a very important historical document. But with "The Reawakening," Levi becomes a truly great writer. His writerly gifts are impressive on so many levels -- but it is his uncanny, Chekhov-like ability to sketch characters and situations with astonishing vividness that is most... more info
An Important and Entertaining Memoir:
The Reawakening opens in January 1945, when author Primo Levi is released from a Nazi concnetration camp by Russian troops. His health almost ruined, suffering from unbearable knowledge of the crimes committed in the camps, Levi re-enters the world to find that it has been turned upside down by the war. Improbably - he explains in an afterword that it is not in his nature to hate - he finds in himself a capacity to see the world afresh, almost as a child would.
In the rest of the book, we accompany Levi... more info
A Great Work:
This is just one of the many brilliant writings of Primo Levi but it tells a tale of Holocaust survival that is often overlooked. Most narratives seem to end at liberation and this one gives us a detailed view of what happened afterwards. This is the book that the movie "The Truce" (which is also the title of this book in Italy)is loosely based on. I don't think the movie did the book justice at all and so I would especially recommend this book to anyone that has seen the movie. Like all of Levi's works it... more info
Carnival World:
Like Survival in Auschwitz and The Periodic Table, The Reawakening is populated with Levi's brilliant language and fascination with character. In Survival, Table and Reawakening, Levi is careful not to force facts into a satisfyingly explanatory story. The Reawakening is a picaresque without the moral center. Levi travels home through a carnival world, a Europe simultaneously stunned and ecstatic, a landscape of displaced characters, Greek villagers in Polish refugee camps, complicit Germans sitting down to... more info
