Her First American

by Lore Segal

Book Overview

A classic novel of the immigrant experience
"Lore Segal may have come closer than anyone to writing the Great American Novel." --The New York Times Book Review

She's Ilka Weissnix, a young Jewish refugee from Hitler's Europe, newly arrived in the United States. He's Carter Bayoux, her first American: a middle-aged, hard-drinking Black intellectual. Lore Segal's brilliant novel is the story of their love affair--one of the funniest and saddest in modern fiction.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 1565849493
• ISBN13: 9781565849495
• Release Date: November 2004
• Publisher: New Press
• Length: 304 Pages
• Weight: 0.80 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.8" x 5.3" x 8.1"

Customer Reviews

The melting in the melting pot

To Ilka, a Viennese refugee newly arrived in the Big Apple, everything is fresh and new and eye-opening. And nothing more so than Carter Bayoux, a black intellectual with both astounding strengths and, as it happens, soul-wrenching weaknesses. Carter becomes Ilka's guide to the real America, both in Nevada (or was it Utah?) and in New York City. A rather wonderful novel, HFA offers reflections on what it means to be an American, how one becomes an American--starting out completely differently--and how one deals with the problems of being an American, not least of which is the problem of how such different people manage to live together. Highly recommended.