The
narrative begins in Cluj, Romania, a city of about 200,000 in which
Romanians, Hungarians and Jews lived in relative peace though not
without underlying ethnic and anti-Semitic tensions. This book consists
principally of stories about the narrator's childhood and adolescence
as the son of impoverished Holocaust survivors. His parents are unable
to talk about their past, but their lives – and the lives of their two
sons - are utterly shaped by it. As the narrator sheds the relative
innocence of childhood, he becomes more consciously aware of his
parents' profound loneliness, the glaring gaps in his family's history
and the questions that go unanswered.
At fourteen, the narrator
is required to leave school in order to learn a trade and earn money to
help support his parents and elder brother who continues in school and
is headed for the university. The injustice and indignity of being
yanked out of school by his uncle on behalf of his parents is
exacerbated by a newfound view of his parents' powerlessness. This is
painful, but also freeing. Adolescent experimentation, the daily grind
of factory work, direct experiences of anti-Semitism, and big dreams of
escaping the politically restrictive system in which he lives shape the
narrator's stories.
It is from this context, that the narrator
and his brother embark on a trip to Czechoslovakia in January 1969,
with the expectation of never seeing their parents and friends again.
They travel by train to Czechoslovakia in the months shortly after the
Russian invasion of Prague. There, after several failed attempts, they
succeed in crossing the border to Austria and find their way to Vienna.
Arriving in Vienna shortly after Christmas-time, they are awed by the
glitter and abundance. The narrative ends with the two brothers leaving
Vienna for Israel.
The life and events recounted in "Leaving -
Memories of Romania" set the stage for a second volume in which the
narrator (and author) travels to Israel, Europe, and Canada in search
of a home in the West. Eventually he settles in the United States where
he is a professor of Latin American Literature.