Gentleman's Agreement

by Laura Z. Hobson

Book Overview

The plot of GENTLEMAN'S AGREEMENT concerns the experiences of a young Gentile writer who poses as a Jew in order to secure material on anti-Semitism for a series of magazine articles. A thesis novel... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Hardcover
• ISBN: B00220IS46
• Release Date: January 1947
• Publisher: Simon and Schuster
• Weight: 1.02 lbs.

Customer Reviews

What is it Like to Be a Jew for Only Six Weeks?

Written in the 1940's, this book tackles the problems of anti-semitism. A journalist decides 'to be a Jew' for six weeks, to view anti-semitism ethnographically, from the inside out. It is interesting to see the different attitudes about sex, gender roles, and social mores of the 1940's. It was a good book and probably ground-breaking for its time. I saw the movie, starring Gregory Peck, several years ago and that was also good.

"You're Not Any More Jewish Than I Am."

GENTLEMAN'S AGREEMENT concerns the experiences of one Philip S. Green, an investigative reporter who decides to pretend he's Jewish to get to the heart of modern American anti-Semitism. Although written in 1946 and concerning the immediate post-World War Two era (the late months of 1945, the peak of New Deal liberalism, and the growing Conservative reactionaryism of the time), GENTLEMAN'S AGREEMENT still reads well, despite its occasional heavy-handed moralizing. Though some of the more grotesque evidences of open anti-Semitism have virtually disappeared from the American scene in the last sixty years (avowedly "restricted" clubs and the like), author Laura Z. Hobson's theme that there's an "us" and a "them" in America is unhappily still timely. Replace the word "Jewish" with any other, and GENTLEMAN'S AGREEMENT is just as illuminating now as it was in 1946. Hobson spends almost no time on her Jewish characters qua Jews. The Holocaust gets a fleeting one-sentence mention, though the mere fact that Hobson wrote GENTLEMAN'S AGREEMENT at all in 1946 places it squarely in the realm of "Holocaust Literature." Hobson gives us no discourse with Judaism or Jewish culture as such, but for her purposes as an author none of that matters. The representative Jewish characters in these pages, Dave Goldman and Dr. Lieberman, are thoroughgoing Americans, totally assimilated and non-religious; yet, like Phil Green, the non-Jewish Jewish protagonist, they are battered and subjected to a bewildering array of overt and covert attacks, exclusions, and snide comments. They also demonstrate a sense of identity as Jewish individuals which Green first questions, then admires, and finally adopts. The shock of his friends and co-workers upon discovering that he is indeed a Christian is palpable. Many of them (including Phil's supposedly "liberal" fiancee, Kathy) are forced to confront their own preconceptions and prejudices. A fine book which needs to find its place in the American consciousness, GENTLEMAN'S AGREEMENT comes highly recommended.

A good book that is, sadly, not dated

Although the book takes place in 1946 and concerns rampant anti-semitism, both overt and subtle, it's a book that trancends time. The book's anti-semitism could easily be replaced by any other kind of racism and feel right at home in 2005. The story concerns a liberal Christian writer who takes on a magazine assignment to write about anti-semitism and his angle is to pose as a Jew so he can find out firsthand. It is a rude awakening for him, whether it is a hotel that does not cater to "those people" or a fiancee making off-hand anti-semitic remarks and thinking nothing of it. Some people might get thrown by writing that was done fifty years ago, but it is a book well worth reading.