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K'tia, A Savior of the Jewish People

by Roberta Kalechofsky

pbk.    264 pgs
ISBN: 978-0-916288-52-5

$14.95

Description

This is a collection of fourteen short stories that trace the inter-relationship of Jew, pagan, and Christian from the time of Augustan Rome to the present. Many of the stories are based on real incidents.

The story of K'tia is a good example of this. "K'tia" is a codeword the Talmud used to refer to the Roman senator, Flavius Clemens, nephew to the emperor, Domitian, and in line to be emperor himself. The word means "the cut one" or the "circumcised one" and seems to refer to the fact that Flavius Clemens had converted to Judaism.

A theme of most of the stories is the impact of the "megalomaniacal" impulse in human beings and its impact on history from the time of Caligula to Hitler.

Reviews

"Roberta Kalechofsky writes brilliantly about Jews in the Roman Empire, people in the Spanish Inquisition, tales of Nazis and pogroms. The cultural environment is harsh, crazy, or decadent as we potchky through the millennia....None of these stories are directly or simply told. They are often detached and seem from a recondite angle....The range and literary resourcefulness of these historical tales make them delicious verbal études masterfully executed.

Whether we are dealing with the Faustian presence of Domitian or the more folksy world of Bessarabia, Roberta has presented us with more ways of telling a story than we knew were possible before we read her latest book. Anyone who loves pure, sheer delight of literary mastery should read Roberta Kalechofsky. She is one of a kind."

Mathew Paris, Home Planet News