People Love Dead Jews

Reports from a Haunted Present

By: Dara Horn

Narrated by: Xe Sands

Length: 6 hrs and 23 mins

Publisher's summary

A startling and profound exploration of how Jewish history is exploited to comfort the living.

Renowned and beloved as a prizewinning novelist, Dara Horn has also been publishing penetrating essays since she was a teenager. Often asked by major publications to write on subjects related to Jewish culture - and increasingly in response to a recent wave of deadly anti-Semitic attacks - Horn was troubled to realize what all of these assignments had in common: She was being asked to write about dead Jews, never about living ones. In these essays, Horn reflects on subjects as far-flung as the international veneration of Anne Frank, the mythology that Jewish family names were changed at Ellis Island, the blockbuster traveling exhibition Auschwitz, the marketing of the Jewish history of Harbin, China, and the little-known life of the "righteous Gentile" Varian Fry. Throughout, she challenges us to confront the reasons why there might be so much fascination with Jewish deaths, and so little respect for Jewish lives unfolding in the present.

Horn draws upon her travels, her research, and also her own family life - trying to explain Shakespeare’s Shylock to a curious 10-year-old, her anger when swastikas are drawn on desks in her children’s school, the profound perspective offered by traditional religious practice and study - to assert the vitality, complexity, and depth of Jewish life against an anti-Semitism that, far from being disarmed by the mantra of "Never forget", is on the rise. As Horn explores the (not so) shocking attacks on the American Jewish community in recent years, she reveals the subtler dehumanization built into the public piety that surrounds the Jewish past - making the radical argument that the benign reverence we give to past horrors is itself a profound affront to human dignity.

©2021 Dara Horn (P)2021 Recorded Books

Good book- good/bad title

There are so many good things about this book, the title is not one of them.
First the performance by the narrator is top notch. The inflections and pace are great. She does a wonderful job.
The title. Let's talk about that. The title is the point, but it is so raw when I want to recommend it to a co-worker, I need to buffer the title with a long disclaimer. The point is that the general public of well meaning gentiles love Jews when something horrid has happened. Live Jews (now I'm remembering 2 Live Jews- hip hop) yeah, people are a little less interested. Fair. And that's the theme of the book.
What did I love about the book? So much, I will try to tackle most of them.
I'm a practicing Catholic and I felt a connection to the author when she talked about visiting China and visiting a synagogue that was no longer an operating one, because most of the Jews of the town were forced to flee or were killed. She was illustrating how well preserved/ reconstructed it was because the space invoked familiar feelings of asking how late she was for the service and the physical ritual muscle memory that kicks in when in such a space.
Another topic was on antisemetism... okay not another topic, it is the main topic, but in one essay, she pairs it to Purim and Hanukkah. One, Purim represented pure let's kill the Jews. The other Hanukkah represented we like Jews as long as they are not Jewish.
Something that will require more thought is all the Holocaust memorials that were all the rage in the 1990s. I worked at one of those places. Do they help make it so this will never happen again? Well it keeps happening, to Jews and others. Jews keep getting attacked and killed. Which takes us back to the title.
Lastly, she tackles the Merchant of Venice. She makes a great argument and I am willing to concede that it is an antisemitic piece. But it doesn't make me think of Shakespeare any less. He was who he was and Elizabethan England was not a Jew friendly place and never will be. It is what it is.

The last 10 minutes

The book provided an interesting perspective. In a post October 7th world the last 10 minutes offered

phenomenal overview of Judaism continuity

This book provides deep insights into antisemitism, beautifully written, with historical anecdotes and personal views. Real food for thought. Thank you!

Required reading

This should be required reading in every high school across America. The research done for this is impeccable. The story is extraordinarily relatable whether you are Jewish or not. The relevance of this is unmatched. In addition to the seriousness of the text, the story is also humorous, heartwarming, and terrifying. Dr. Horn has written a remarkable and significant historical piece of literature.

Awesome!

This is a wonderful book read by a good narrator. Only one nit: the name chava is pronounced with a gutteral ch

Excellent and Disturbing

Loved this book. Horn cogently challenges the popular thinking on anti-semitism. The book was powerful, informative, and eye-opening.

Outstanding and so important

I couldn't put this down. I listened at every opportunity and finished it within a couple of days. Surely one of the best books I've listened to so far and I've listened to dozens by now. The author, Dara Horn writes about the many faces of antisemitism, many of which are so subtle and have been around so long, that they pass beneath our radar and have become "acceptable." She pulls back the curtain to reveal something so uncomfortable that we often look away or sometimes don't even notice. I really like her gradual, methodical pace and found myself riveted throughout. The narration by Xe Sands is so well done that it feels as if she wrote the book. Very thought provoking. It occupies my mind even though I've finished it. Great book.

Dara’s historical and personal references, and her style of writing.

History repeating itself. Now, with the perspective of October 7, the worst massacre is since the holocaust. 

True

I never realized how much ppl actually do love dead Jews until listening to this book.

Essential

An exploration from a new perspective of the devil that never dies, anti Semitism. Recommend highly to everyone. Not just Jews.