It may fall just short of that status and more closely fit the way an original review in Maclean's magazine described it: "a comic myth." This is the story of the founding of a family dynasty through the eyes of an outside chronicler, Moses Berger, who is the son of a poet who the family supported. His quest to unravel their story leads to the enigmatic Ephraim Gursky: document forger in Victorian England, sole. I found I wanted to move into the worlds he created and meet these people - the ultimate testament of a good book. - but above any of them, this book seemed, I really enjoyed the start to this novel, with its mythical allusions (a raven, a mysterious stranger, evocations of something terrible, etc.) I have tried Mordecai Richler and failed. Berger, is in the grips of an obsession. Readers may spend the first part of ''Solomon Gursky Was Here'' wondering about its title, only to discover, halfway through, that the search for Solomon is very much at the novel's center. Berger, is in the grips of an obsession. What people are saying - Write a review. Undoubtedly Mordecai Richler's tour the force, Solomon Gursky Was Here is an epic in the truest sense of the word. An alcoholic Montreal writer named Moses Berger is writing a book about the Gursky (read Bronfman) family, founders and owners of the McTavish (read Seagram) Distillers. Moses Berger's obsession with the Gursky dynasty pitches the reader from an early 19th century Durham coal mine to the 1980s Eastern Townships, with Franklin's disastrous voyage to find the Northwest passage and the building of a commercial empire based on the sale and production of alcohol with the murkiest, muddiest, most questionable of methods that slide in and out of legality in a slippery and deadly game. I find it pretty infuriating when an author does that. But I don't generally have a hard time keeping track of complex, non-chronological narratives. by Penguin Canada. 4 out of 5 stars 4.3 out of 5.0 5 Stars 9 4 Stars 7 3 Stars 4 2 Stars 0 1 Stars 0 Performance. Fleeing court action against him and his family, Solomon reportedly died in a plane crash. I don’t have the patience, though, for the machismo and the repetitive details around the crotchety Magog community and the garrulous, backstabbing Gurskys. This was shortlisted for the Booker prize. Kind of a chaotic structure with very dense passages. His quest to unravel their story leads to the enigmatic Ephraim Gursky: document forger in Victorian England, sole survivor of the ill-fated Franklin expedition and charasmatic religious leader of the Arctic. Solomon Gursky Was Here book. Solomon Gursky Was Here. Vast. Solomon Gursky is told in a non-linear fashion, jumping around in both Moses' personal timeline as well as through four generations of the legendary Gursky family. Had any novice writer turned in that description, I suspect it'd be pinned to the staff bulletin board just for laughs. Refresh and try again. However, it's quite entertaining, funny and well written, and a bit of a detective story as well. Richler's novels (The Apprenticeship of Duddy Kravitz, St. Urbain's Horseman) are exuberant, stew-like affairs, and this one is no exception, with especial tang. The family tree is helpful, but a solid friends- and acquaintances tree might have come in handy as well. This was pretty good most of the way through, though I think it may have been just a hair too long, since by the end I found myself wondering what it added to have the timelines and characters all mixed up, where at the start I found this pleasing. In what is touted by critics as possibly Canadian author Mordecai Richler’s best novel, we accompany Moses Berger in his obsessive quest to unravel the secrets of the Gurskys, a Jewish family who ran one of the biggest Canadian business empires. Some truly striking nuggets of writings about Canada can be also found in the book, which I would definitely recommend. I would give it a 5 if I were only expressing the pleasure I had in reading this hilarious and interesting shaggy family saga based mainly on the Canadian Bronfman family, of Prohibition liquor running fame. Convoluted but intriguing family saga of Jewish folk in the far north. He won the Commonwealth Prize, the Paris Review Humour Prize, was twice shortlisted for the Booker Prize for his novels Solomon Gursky Was Here and St. Urbain's Horseman, and was nominated for an Oscar for his screenplay of The Apprenticeship of Duddy Kravitz. But I really loved Richler's prose, and it was fun to experience pieces of Montreal and the surrounding area in the time capsule of this book. Narrated by: Colm Feore. The Gursky family with its colourful bootlegging history, its bizarre connections with... Free Shipping on all orders over $10. Moses Berger's obsession with the Gursky dynasty pitches the reader from an early 19th century Durham coal mine to the 1980s Eastern Townships, with Franklin's disastrous voyage to find the Northwest passage and the building of a commercial empire based on the sale and production of alcohol with the murkiest, muddiest, most questionable of methods that slide in and out of legality in a slippery and deadly game. The joke-filled saga of the devious and occasionally vicious Gursky clan revolves around a serious theme: This is the only Canadian novel Canada I can think of might be called an epic. This is my first foray into Mordecai Richler's adult fiction. Berger, son of the failed poet L.B. Novels with this kind of structure just aren't my thing. Mordecai Richler doesn't pull any punches and is not kind his readers, especially if the latest have just a vague knowledge of Judaism and Jewish culture. Solomon Gursky Was Here. Winner of the 1990 Commonwealth Writers Prize, shortlisted for the Booker Prize 1990. The main flaw — noticeable in my rereading 30 years after initial publication — is Richler's tendency to drift from witty, incisive satire to clumsy and contemptuous sideswipes. It is implied that it is disappointment with his own father, the failed poet L. B. Berger, with whom Moses has a deeply dysfunctional relationship that put him on the trail of Solomon, a character as strong-willed as he was mysterious. Hilarious stuff. Filled to the brim with various characters (many of them very colourful, I admit, but they were extremely numerous as well) and switching back and forth endlessly between remote past, past and present, this novel had me turning back pages more often than I liked. I was expecting something a lot more coherent out of a man who was supposedly one of the great Canadian novelists. Solomon Gursky was Here. The story is loosely held together by Moses Berger, an alcoholic writer obsessed with the family who has accumulated scraps of information over a lifetime. Solomon Gursky Was Here is a novel by Canadian author Mordecai Richler first published by Viking Canada in 1989. Berger, is in the grips of an obsession. Overall. this was a re-read for me... but i last read it when it was published (1989) and have a crap memory. Kundenbewertungen. The main problems (aside from the obvious time-jumps and POV skips) were the self-indulgent twaddle (to give an example, Richler's gratuitous depiction of Eastern Township bars and their patrons, something that might be akin to "local colour" but went on far too long, pages of the stuff that are ultimately meaningless), the loss of the mythological and emergence of the farcical or cartoonish (had this not been written pre-1989, I would have sworn Mr. Bernard was taken directly from Montgomery Burns in The Simpsons), and Richler's apparent inability to write convincing female characters, which seems to rival Cormac McCarthy's ineptitude (e.g., the introduction to Beatrice's character reveals her as a "raven-haired beauty, with breasts too rudely full for such a trim figure and coal-black eyes that shone with too much appetite.") Solomon Gursky Was Here (Book) : Richler, Mordecai : Penguin PutnamBerger, son of the failed poet L.B. More By and About This Author. I enjoyed this book a lot. Elusive, mysterious and powerful, Solomon Gursky hovers in the background, always out of Moses' grasp, but present-like an omen. Viking, 1989 - Explorers - 557 pages. What a hard book to rate ! Luckily, Solomon Gursky is the polestar that sets much of this back on course. The novel tells of several generations of the fictional Gursky family, who are connected to several disparate events in the history of Canada, including the Franklin Expedition and rum-running. History buffs, people who enjoy mob stories, Canadians, Jewish people. The story freewheels through cannibalism, religious beliefs, alcohol running during the prohibition and the search of Moses Berger for a father to replace his own (who found his son to be too much of a threat). Mordecai Richler's penultimate novel, and certainly his most ambitious, Solomon Gursky Was Here is a yarn spun around the Gursky brothers - Bernard, Morrie, and Solomon - kings of a whiskey empire forged from bootlegging, millionaires many times over, and based on Canada's Bronfman family. Berger, son of the failed poet L.B. Average Customer Ratings. 5 stars: 1: 4 stars: 5: 3 stars: 1: 2 stars: 0: 1 star: 0: LibraryThing Review User Review - bodachliath - LibraryThing. Moses Berger is an alcoholic writer who has become obsessed with the life and fate of the mysterious Solomon Gursky. Further suggestions might be found on the article's talk page. Novels with this kind of structure just aren't my thing. A lot of information is given, many allusions are made that you'll probably understand only if you read the book 2 or 3 times, PoVs mercilessly jump from one character to the next, from one CENTURY to the next. I didn't care for the book but it's well written. The Gursky family with its colourful bootlegging history, its bizarre connections with the North and the Inuit, and its wildly eccentric relations, both fascinates and infuriates him. The road to the end is winding, but never tiring or dull. Janofsky, J: "Whiskey sour: a great family saga full of booze, ambition … and shame", Learn how and when to remove this template message, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Solomon_Gursky_Was_Here&oldid=1001336734, Articles needing additional references from July 2010, All articles needing additional references, Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License, This page was last edited on 19 January 2021, at 07:01. January 29th 2002 The build up to knowing what had happened to Solomon, the way the story of Ephraim was woven into it all. Berger, the son of a Jewish poet, a drunkard and an unsuccessful writer, particularly searches for traces of Solomon Gursky, the most enigmatic of the three Gursky brothers who saw the rise of their family’s fortune during the prohibition years as bootle. But the rest was great. This truly is an astonishing read, and shows a depth & breadth of reach that many people might not have believed Mr. Richler capable of achieving. I think as late as the final few chapters, Richler was STILL introducing new characters!! He calls people to reform and become religious. die-hard Richler fans who like Dickensian-type sagas. In what is touted by critics as possibly Canadian author Mordecai Richler’s best novel, we accompany Moses Berger in his obsessive quest to unravel the secrets of the Gurskys, a Jewish family who ran one of the biggest Canadian business empires. Imagine if I told you the story of Dr. Seuss’s “The Cat in the Hat” in the following way: What a rollicking humdinger of a roller coaster ride! Jacob Two-Two Meets the Hooded Fang. I read a significant number of Richler's books in my 20's. Of Ephraim's three grandsons, Bernard has fought, wheeled and cheated his way to the head of a liquor empire. But the rest was great. For example, a minor detail or character being mentioned, and then not being mentioned again for another two-hundred pages, leaving you confused when they/it are intrinsic to the plot. Now make it contiguous with 200 years of Canadian history. Bernard died on a Monday, at the age of seventy-five, his body wasted. This article about a historical novel of the 1980s is a stub. The story is not told in a linear way, but bucks and switches between time and place, from Canada to China and all points between, mixing legend and truth, mixing Jewish and Inuit mythology. 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