The Young Joseph
book — Germany — 1934

7.0
This is the second part of T.Mann`s tertalogy about Joseph from the Bible who`s known to most people in connection with his brothers. I`m not sure why I took the second part of the novel from my library. Not that this would be the kind of book where you absolutely must read from the first page til the end - the story isn`t exactly new and unexpected twists aren`t a thing to look for in a book like this one. So this part tells us about Joseph`s youth (as the title clearly suggests) - when he`s in his teenage years, starts having his stupid non-sexual dreams, pisses his brothers off, is thrown by his brothers in a hole, rescued by some travellers and close to being sold into slavery into Egypt. I`d rather not talk about the story but what I thought of Joseph. To me he is an annoying brat, completely deserving the attitude his brothers have towards him. He just thinks that he`s sooo clever, sooo good looking and so much better than everybody else that he needs to wake up and smell the coffee. And the best thing to do that is being thrown in a hole in the ground with a nice perspective of dying there. Now let`s hear what I have to say about the book. First it was quite hard to get into it - T.Mann is a bit a heavy writer, relying quite massively on the German tradition of writing every detail you`ll never need in your life and doing to in quite a boring manner. Later on I found out that it`s quite a rewarding read, yet mainly for my German and not for my soul. It`s good, it`s well-written but it`s not my kind of literature. I may be happy having read at least one of Mann`s works but I`m not planning reading any other part of "Joseph and his brothers" right now.
2005-09-03
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