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This week’s podcast is in honor of the novelist Amir Gutfreund, who died four weeks ago at the age of 52. Host Marcela Sulak reads the opening of his first novel, Our Holocaust, a colorful description of the narrator’s Grandpa Lolek:

“He usually burst into our world in his 1970 Vauxhall, a moribund chassis of protestations upon which only he could impose life. Always wearing a tie, always smoking and dressed in colorful grandeur, he would emerge from the Vauxhall as if he were Kaiser Franz Joself out to wave at the masses from his balcony. Within minutes he would be sitting at the table drinking tea, eating whatever cake he was served, and smoking a cigarette.”

Gutfreund was born in Haifa to Holocaust survivors. He earned an MA in applied mathematics from the Technion in Haifa, and went on to serve as an officer in the air force doing mathematical research for 20 years. He retired with the rank of Lt. Colonel.

Text:
Our Holocaust. Amir Gutfreund (2001). Translated by Jessica Cohen. AmazonCrossing, 2006.

Further reading:
The World A Moment Later. Amir Gutfreund (2005). Translated by Jessica Cohen. AmazonCrossing, 2011.

Music:
Mieczysław Fogg – Odpukaj Pan
Fajga Jofe – Abduł Bey

Producer: Laragh Widdess
Technical producer: Alex Benish