The Book of Daniel

I have read most of E.L. Doctorow's novels and take great pleasure in the smoothness of their narratives, the sense that Doctorow has not misplaced or misused a single word. This same master's quality is evident in "The Book of Daniel", where it brings great imaginative precision to the lives of the Paul and Rachel Isaacson, a couple who are executed as spies and who are modeled on the Rosenbergs. To me, the book's most moving writing has the narrator, the Isaacson's son Daniel, remembering his parents as people with friends and commonplace lives, not as the couple who became powerful political symbols. In the book's end, Doctorow puts Dr. Mindish, the government's chief witness against the Isaacsons, in Disney Land 15 years after the trial, spinning pathetically on a ride, lacking identity in a gaudy and forgetful America.

E L Doctorow's "The Book of Daniel" filled me with an indescribable sense of horror I wasn't remotely prepared for. I confess to being a novice in American history but when I finished the book, I thought perhaps I understood for the first time the political landscape that inspired Arthur Miller's "The Crucible", which I recall having studied for my A-levels English literature exams many years ago. It seems to me that madness lies latent and lurks beneath every human society, even one that professes to be the universal champion of human rights. In Doctorow's words, "the Isaacsons were confirmed in guilt because of who campaigned for their freedom, and their supporters discredited because they campaigned for the Isaacsons" - a totally circular and tautologous logic ! Yet, the novel's central concern isn't necessarily about the tragic path Paul and Rochelle Isaacson took to the electric chair, but about the permanent and devastating impact the arrest and murder of the Isaacsons had on the lives of their two small children, Daniel and Susan. How else can one explain the perfect boy, Daniel's sudden, cruel and violent turns which visits his own wife and son long after his parents' tragic death. Or the intelligent Susan's continued breakdown and descent into madness. Doctorow certainly takes wild liberties with time, jumping backwards and forwards in his narration. He also mixes first and third person narrative techniques and uses a blend of historical fact and commentary to reinforce the power of the tragedy. Reading "The Book of Daniel" was an eye-opening and harrowing experience for me. It moved me to tears and even reflecting on it sends chills down my spine. This is essential reading. Powerful and harrowing - "The Book of Daniel" is a truly collosal literary achievement. Read it !

I would like to say that I read this book because I'd heard of it, I'd heard of the author, and I really wanted to know what was so special about it. But the truth is that I read it because I had nothing else to read.However, from the moment I picked it up I knew that this was a special book. From the first page I knew that it would challenge and entertain and inform. From the first page I was enthralled.As a student of the Cold War and American 20th century history from abroad, it seems as if America's novelists have a cathartic urge to understand their country, perhaps unmatched anywhere in the world. There is a burning desire to understand what it was all about that enthralls many authors: DeLillo, Roth, to name a couple. This book is perhaps the best example of that quest for meaning in a period many people still find troubling.It is utterly human, brilliantly engaging, wonderfully drawn, and devastatingly important. When I picked it up, I'd never heard of E.L.Doctorow, by the time I put it down I was resolved to read everything he has written. Unspeakably wonderful. A great novel.

This is the first book I've read from E.L. Doctorow. His style is initially disconcerting because it isn't tethered to a linear structure. Time can't progress without folding in on itself. Even sentences are often interrupted and excised of all punctuation. Perspectives shift between first and third person -- which a previous reviewer noted can be confusing. Yet the book is so saturated in details, the characters display so many nuanced shades of anger and pride and cruelty and love, that it brings the book to a level that everyone can understand. The people in this book are such smart asses, all of them! Daniel's grandmother, the black man in his basement, the pathetic palsied Mindish who we're never quite permitted to hate. In that sense "Daniel" is a politically sophisticated work in that it acknowledges politics and government as flawed and limited structures created by flawed and limited people (like sentences). Daniel observes that his sister died by a lack of analysis. It's evident that an abundance of such is how he hopes to keep living. I left the book feeling like I was cheating myself by not having a mind as active and relentless as Daniel's. I'm grateful for this book. And I'm sort of glad it isn't very popular. Seems to confirm its authenticity.