Good People | Nir Baram

Professor Moshe Zimmermann

April 4, 2010EN

“Good people” depicts accurately and with great talent and vast historical research the roll of regular people, “Fine People”, who served the Nazi regime but did not see themselves as supporters of the Nazi ideology. In particularly the novel describes the roll of those well educated senior officials who served the Nazi regime and advanced its plans while claiming they are defending the honor of Germany.

(Moshe Zimmermann, Professor of German History. Head of The Richard Koebner Minerva Center for German History)

Amos Oz

March 3, 2010EN

The novel is written with great talent, momentum and ingenuity while in its core lays vast curiosity, which is first and for most a moral curiosity. This book expands the borders of young literature and opens new landscapes for it. Thomas and Alexandra are depicted as complex characters; each one has contradictions and depth.

(Amos Oz)

A. B. Yehoshua

March 3, 2010EN

‘Good People‘ sets a new standard to the literature of us all. It is a bold and brilliant novel that walks the path of greatness to the edge of the literary abyss and still manages to render the ambitions and pretensions that were invested in it by its young author. This is a novel that defines a way for Israeli literature to further expand its world view and dare to deal with human and historical matters that are not necessarily connected to our own personal adversities.

(A. B. Yehoshua)

Haaretz Nili Mirski

March 3, 2010HE

There is a dual reality that is portrayed eloquently in the novel Good Pepole – Soviet Russia on the one hand and Nazi Germany on the other. The writing aspires to deal with great events and succeeds in fulfilling its expectations completely and with amazing talent. There’s something grandiose about this novel, it’s a sort of architectural structure that is monumental in my eyes.

The story begins with the Night of Broken Glass (Kristallnacht) which took place in Germany and proceeds in describing the life under Stalin’s horror regime, and so continues to alternate between Germany and Russia, until it reaches the crucial meeting between the German hero and the Russian heroin that takes place on the eve of the Nazi invasion to Russia. There are many accurate and sharp observations regarding power mechanisms and regimes along with a sober look on people – “good people”, which generate horrors.

I cannot recall another Israeli author that tried to deal with these subjects. Nir Baram contends with one of the darkest chapters of world history in a way that seems to me as a heroic enterprise. This is also what makes this book a unique one-time occasion in the Israeli literature field.

(Nili Mirski, Haaretz)