Product Description

As Cold War hysteria inflames America, FBI agents pay a surprise visit to a Communist man and his wife in their New York apartment. After a trial that divides the country, the couple are sent to the electric chair for treason. Decades later, in 1967, their son Daniel struggles to understand the tragedy of their lives. But while he is tormented by his past and trying to appreciate his own wife and son, Daniel is also haunted, like millions of others, by the need to come to terms with a country destroying itself in the Vietnam War. A stunning fictionalization of a political drama that tore the United States apart, The Book of Daniel is an intensely moving tale of martyrdom and the search for meaning.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #59885 in Books
• Published on: 2006-02-02
• Original language: English
• Binding: Paperback
• 400 pages

About the Author
E.L. Doctorow is one of America's most accomplished and acclaimed living writers. Winner of the National Book Award, the National Book Critics Circle Award (twice), the PEN/Faulkner Award, and the National Humanities Medal, he is the author of nine novels that have explored the drama of American life from the late 19th century to the 21st. Jonathan Freedland is a weekly columnist on the Guardian, for which he once served as US correspondent. He is the author of Bring Home the Revolution: The Case for a British Republic and, most recently, a family memoir, Jacob's Gift. His first novel is The Righteous Men, published under the pseudonym Sam Bourne.

Customer Reviews

A powerful read
Whilst reading The Book of Daniel by E.L Doctorow with interest, I was so absorbed, gripped and emotionally touched. The novel concerns a boy (Daniel) and mentally unstable sister Susan. The events surrounding their young lives is not a phleasant picture at all. The mental trauma and pain of witnessing their parents being trialled and executed for committing treason adds the shocking experience. Treason is defined as a nationalist disclosing information to other nations for harmful and unlawful purposes. In context of the novel, Daniel parents acted as spies by disclosing information to Russians during the cold war for creating an atom bomb that is capable of causing immense disasters, which I do not want to even want to comprehend in words.

The key issues underlying the novel is firstly old political regimes gain continued support by extremist and left wing communist parties. Daniel's parents are registered as members of the party. Their sole aim is to overthrow the socialist party and seek to promote equality in society which includes a classless society and equal distribution of income and wealth. Another issue tackled is capital punishment. Do you think people should be sentenced to death for committing serious crimes, in which it is you as an individual to judge and have the desire to live in a stable society? The purpose of the review is to offer my opinion and views on the novel, but not to discuss issues in details, just to identify. This is the general background of the novel.

The turning point of the novel is when Daniel's parents are arrested by the FBI for their involvement in a conspiracy to commit treason. Daniel's life dramatically changes. He has to accept life without parents, which is very hard and take responsibility at such a young age for taking care of his mentally unstable sister. The novel is set in 1960's America, which runs in parallel with the past and present. It is about the American society and the political extremist who want to voice their opinions and views.

If you have a passion for American history and politics, read The Book of Daniel. It is a good read, but you may find it a little heavy and disturbing.

Doctorow brings U.S history to life
E.L Doctorow's most prevalent skill as a writer, apparent in most, if not all of his novels, is to heave American History, breathing, writhing and alive, directly onto the printed page. `The Book of Daniel' demonstrates the way in which the writer achieves this remarkable feat.

Doctorow's novel is a fictionalised account of the trial and execution of the Rosenbergs, an American communist couple who were found guilty of conspiracy to overthrow the U.S government by disclosing atomic secrets to the Soviet Union. The fictional counterparts to Julius and Ethel Rosenberg are Paul and Rochelle Isaacson. Apart from some minor differences, the events of the novel largely reflect those of the Rosenberg case. The Isaacsons, like the Rosenbergs, are put to death at the end of the novel, by means of electric chair.

Like the inevitable eruption of Vesuvius in Robert Harris's 'Pompeii', the impending doom of the Isaacsons is inevitable, and the tension is slowly elevated as the plot slowly unravels to this grisly denouement. Although we know throughout that the Isaacsons can not and will not be saved, the importance of the novel rests in how the novel's protagonist Daniel, the son of Paul and Rochelle, attempts to come to terms with the events of a case which becomes one of the most important political events of the 20th Century. The Isaacsons becomes objects in a political tug-of-war; to those on the right they are traitors to their nation, to the communists they become martyrs. Doctorow constantly reminds of this conflict between the human and the political; that the Rosenbergs were not just political symbols; they were human beings, and most importantly, parents.

Do not allow the explicitly political themes of the novel to put you off; the novel is accessible and the prose is exciting, witty, and concise. The dialogue is acceptable although not remarkable throughout, discounting occasional moments of truly superb dialogue, as shown in the eccentric hippie Artie Steinlicht's politically charged diatribes against Daniel's parents, who he believes `played the game' with the government by `wearing ties' and acquiescing. Doctorow brilliantly contrasts the ideals of the Old Left, represented by Daniel's parents, with Daniel and Steinlicht's disillusioned, disaffected generation of rebels.

While the novel does explore political issues, it is chiefly concerned with Daniel's humanity; he is a fragmented, disconnected individual, unable to love those close to him, and sometimes bordering on the sociopathic. Doctorow's characterisation is so subtlety effective, in the way the reader encounters Daniel in both his formative childhood years, and his adult years as a member of the `hippie' New Left movement, that the reader comes to feel profound concern for Daniel during his lowest moments, in the same way a parent would react to their child being sent to rehab.

The `Book of Daniel' should certainly not be limited to enthusiasts of American History; it is a vibrant, lively novel, worthy of a read by anyone with an appreciation for striking, visceral prose and excellent characterisation. The novel's political themes are particularly relevant today, as like the Cold War and the Vietnam Wars as shown in the novel, George W Bush's `War on Terror' has once more set the political Left in direct opposition to the agenda of a right-wing regime.

a stunning fictionalised account of the Rosenberg trial
This book does not set out to be a history of the Rosenberg executions, and by changing the names of the couple on trial, Doctorow is free to explore the climate of Cold War and McCarthyism that killed the Rosenbergs. The novel is written from the perspective of their son, who is growing up amid the Vietnam War protests, and facing his own crisis of civil unrest. The contrast of the two periods of left wing activism, so often ignored in the USA, is masterful, but the novel neither preaches or steers clear of the issues it raises. Worth buying alone for the glorious deconstruction of Disneyland at the end.