Terrace Books, an imprint of The University of Wisconsin Press

---

Memoir / Judaica / Gay & Lesbian Studies

---

 

My Germany A Jewish Writer Returns to the World His Parents Escaped Lev Raphael The son of Holocaust survivors journeys to a poisoned land in this memoir about shaking off family ghosts Lev Raphael grew up loathing everything German. A son of Holocaust survivors, haunted by his parents’ suffering and traumatic losses under Nazi rule, he was certain that Germany was one place in the world he would never visit. Those feelings shaped his Jewish and gay identity, his life, and his career. Then the barriers of a lifetime began to come down, as revealed in this moving memoir. After his mother’s death, while researching her war years, Raphael found a distant relative living in the very city where she had been a slave laborer. What would he learn if he actually traveled to the place where his mother had found freedom and met his father? Not long after that epochal trip, a German publisher bought several of his books for translation. Raphael was launched on book tours in Germany, discovering not so much a new Germany, but a new self: someone unafraid to face the past and transcend it. “Lev Raphael writes with the precision of a neurosurgeon, the warmth of an ancient storyteller, and the soul of a people that has known the extremes of joy and sorrow, hope and despair, love and hate more than almost any other.”  —The Jewish Bulletin, San Francisco “Stunning and powerful. . . . Lev Raphael’s memoir is a superb work combining intellectual rigor with emotional honesty in exploring his three-fold identity as a son of Holocaust survivors, a Jew, and a gay man.” —Alan L. Berger, Raddock Family Eminent Scholar Chair of Holocaust Studies, Florida Atlantic University “Part travelogue and part detective story, My Germany is a wholly enthralling, beautifully written story of healing and forgiveness.”—Lynne Olson, author of Troublesome Young Men Lev Raphael has spoken about his work on three continents and has been publishing fiction and prose about the Second Generation for over thirty years —longer than any other American author. His nineteen books include The German Money, Writing a Jewish Life, and Dancing on Tisha B’Av. He lives in Okemos, Michigan. • Visit Lev Raphael’s Web site at www.levraphael.com for a schedule of his upcoming appearances • You can now see Raphael on YouTube doing a short reading from My Germany. www.youtube.com/watch?v=UFhrajH-6AE • Raphael's interview with WKAR News on NPR © Morning edition is available here: WKAR interview. • My Germany has a rave review on the Bookslut blog: www.bookslut.com/features/2009_05_014423.php Many other reviews, features, and interviews can be found at: www.levraphael.com/sgrevu_mg.html A trade imprint of the University of Wisconsin Press For more information regarding publicity and reviews contact Chris Caldwell, our publicity manager, phone: (608) 263-0734, email: publicity@uwpress.wisc.edu There is a press kit for this book, see My Germany press kit

April 2009 LC: 2008039540 E 224 pp.   6 x 9   15 b/w illus. Cloth $26.95 t ISBN 978-0-299-23150-7 e-book $12.95 t ISBN 978-0-299-23153-8   Adobe Digital Edition (PDF) About our e-books Printing and cut/paste allowed, access on six different devices. ADD TO CART   Click here for a further explanation of the shopping cart feature. There is a new paperback edition of this title, with a new coda. See new My Germany.   "Raphael’s struggle to emotionally and culturally reconcile with a Germany he could never forgive makes for somber reading. But his struggle to balance his identity as a Jew and a gay man is one even those outside this world can appreciate.” —EDGE  November 1, 2011

Home | Books | Journals | Events | Textbooks | Authors | Related | Search | Order | Contact

If you have trouble accessing any page in this web site, contact our Web manager. E-mail: webmaster@uwpress.wisc.edu Updated December 8, 2011 © 2011, The Board of Regents of the University of Wisconsin System