The Jew

"The Jew" by Józef Ignacy Kraszewski is a story set in the 1800s that looks at what it means to belong, be yourself, and what it’s like to be forced from your home, as seen through the lives of people like Jacob Hamon, a Jewish man from Poland, and Jean Huba, a Polish noble who’s living in exile. The book follows them, along with other exiles and travelers, showing how they deal with not being accepted by society and trying to make sense of the world; it begins in an inn where a Jewish exile suddenly collapses, pulling everyone together to help him. We meet Jacob, who thinks a lot about his Jewish background, and Ivas, a nobleman trying to figure out who he is, and through their talks about their troubles and being in exile, the story begins to tackle the big questions in their lives and societal problems, searching for friendship while dealing with personal struggles.