3 Review(s)

Published in 2002, Everything Is Illuminated is the first book written by American author Jonathan Safran Foer. It proposes the possibility of a responsible duality, of things being one way and also the opposite way. Rather than aligning itself with either "how things were" or "how things could have been," the novel measures the difference between the two, and by doing so, attempts to reflect the way things feel. Summary Of The Book Everything Is Illuminated comprises two interwoven stories, one of which is straightforward and mostly humorous, and the other a heavily stylized work of magical realism. The book begins when the protagonist, Jonathan Safran Foer leaves Princeton for the barren fields of eastern Europe. Equipped with just a photograph, he hopes to find Augustine, a woman who might be a link to his grandfather or may be the one who saved his life from the nazis. He is accompanied on his journey by Alexander Perchov, a young Ukrainian translator, sharp, insightful, and amusing, who is also seeking his lost family, but in his case, the family is alive and near. The journey proceeds into an idealistic misadventure, which at times turns humorous and dramatic, but concludes in the most essential existing questions. Braided into this text is the novel that Jonathan is working on, where he tells in highly literary English a partly magical story about the citizens of Trachimbrod. As the present section moves back in time, the magical story moves forward. Fantasy and reality meet in the last piece when the Nazis encroach Trachimbrod and all is, or isn't, lost. The book, above all things, depicts love between parents and children, between friends, lovers and generations, and between what transpired and what is yet to occur.                   The content and the structure of the book received critical acclaim especially for the manner in which it switches between two story arcs. Jonathan Foer was honored with the National Jewish Book Award and the Guardian First Book Award for the same. Also, the book was adapted into a film by the same name starring Elijah Wood and Eugene Hutz in 2005. About Jonathan Safran Foer Born in September 1977 in Washington, D.C., Jonathan Safran Foer is a well known American novelist and short story writer. Some of his other popular works include Extremely Loud And Incredibly Close, Tree Of Codes, and Eating Animals. In spite of his success, Foer is viewed by some critics as a polarizing figure in modern literature due to his recurrent use of modernist literary devices. He currently teaches creative writing at New York University and resides in Brooklyn, New York, with his wife and two children.