St. Urbain's Horseman; A Novel

New York, N.Y.: Alfred A Knopf, 1971. First Edition [stated], presumed first printing. Hardcover. Very good/Good. [10], 467, [3] pages. DJ has some wear, creased flaps, and some edge wear. Signed by the author on the half-title page. Mordecai Richler (January 27, 1931 - July 3, 2001) was a Canadian writer. His best known works are The Apprenticeship of Duddy Kravitz (1959) and Barney's Version (1997). His 1970 novel St. Urbain's Horseman and 1989 novel Solomon Gursky Was Here were shortlisted for the Man Booker Prize. He is also well known for the Jacob Two-Two children's fantasy series. In addition to his fiction, Richler wrote numerous essays about the Jewish community in Canada, and about Canadian and Quebec nationalism. Richler's Oh Canada! Oh Quebec! (1992), a collection of essays about nationalism and anti-Semitism, generated considerable controversy. This novel is very rich and complex, with fine characterizations and hilarious prose. This story progresses into an interesting ending. Jake Hersh is thirty-seven, a near-rich, near-famous film and TV director living millionairishly in London and loving it--a life that is worlds away from the all-poor, all-Jewish St. Urbain's Street in Montreal, where he was raised. He is the adoring father of three blooming exemplars of the new breed of mixed-marriage kids who belong everywhere, with a stake in Jehovah and a claim on Christ. The whole texture of a life being lived is conveyed in Richler's complex, moving, and wonderfully comic evocation of a generation consumed with guilt--guilt at not joining every battle, at not healing every wound, guilt at not riding hell-for-leather to the rescue of all, side by side with the Avenger himself, St. Urbain's Horseman. Derived from a Kirkus review: A profusion of flashbacks fill in the career and concerns of rugged Jake Hersh, Canadian expatriate in London, film director, happily married with kids; and about to be docked for a morals charge. It seems that Jake, who had stumbled into a kooky friendship with one Harry Stein, a Cockney gutter rat of some enterprise, had been accused of unnatural acts with a German au pair girl. Before the not-so-awful or fulfilling truth is revealed, Jake's past is disinterred: the breakaway from the provincial Canadian mishpocheh; a rocky climb in films; marriage out of the faith: and, continuing through the years, hero-worship of his cousin Joey. in Jake's dreams, Joey is The Horseman, a kind of 20th-century golem, fighting in all good wars, but above all protecting the Jews from enemies past and present. But Joey was, perhaps, also a thief, con man, exploiter of women, mobster and two-bit actor. Jake's escape with just a fine from the court case, and a notice of Joey's death, happen almost simultaneously along with the discovery that Joey's gun (a cherished memento) held blanks. Now in his dreams Jake is the Horseman. There are moments of broad farce, snappy dialogue, and sterling originals.