With the release of The Lost Book of Moses: The Search for the World’s Old­est Bible from Harper­Collins tomor­row, author Chanan Tigay is guest blog­ging here all week as part of the Vis­it­ing Scribe series on The ProsenPeo­ple.


There’s an old joke that goes some­thing like this: Gen­tiles leave, but nev­er say good­bye; Jews say good­bye, but nev­er leave. When it comes to Jews and their books, at least, I think there’s some truth here.

Indeed, among the aspects of Jew­ish tra­di­tion that most appeal to me is our ten­den­cy to read the same books over and over — and over. We read the entire Torah through once each year. And when we fin­ish, we don’t waste a sin­gle moment — as soon as Deuteronomy’s done, we roll imme­di­ate­ly back to In the begin­ning.” Tra­di­tion wants us always to be in the mid­dle of a good book. Last month we read Esther twice. This month we’ll do the same with the Hag­gadah. Eicha, or Lamen­ta­tions: once a year. Kohelet, or Eccle­si­astes: once a year. Song of Songs: once a year (unless you go to one of those shuls that reads it once a week). 

We may leave our books for a while, but we nev­er say goodbye.

As a writer, this repet­i­tive read­ing appeals to me. Indeed, there are a num­ber of books I return to year-in, year-out for inspi­ra­tion, instruc­tion, or pure enjoy­ment. My famil­iar­i­ty with them offers a great sense of well-being as I read and re-read. Open­ing their pages for the umpteenth time, these books make me feel like I’ve come home. Turn it and turn it again, for every­thing is in it,” Pirkei Avot (Ethics of the Fathers) tells us of the Torah. Every­thing” is not to be found in the books that I turn over and over. Still, with each turn, I feel that I gain some new insight. If I’m stuck in my own writ­ing, they may offer a path for­ward. If I’m spent, they may inspire. If I’ve already seen that day’s Sports Cen­ter twice, they offer entertainment.

They’re not all Jew­ish books per se. But the act of read­ing and re-read­ing them feels to me pro­found­ly Jew­ish. And so: my Top 5 Books for Re-Read­ing here, in no par­tic­u­lar order:

Barney’s Ver­sion: This is Morde­cai Richler’s last, and (to my mind) best nov­el. Cranky, fun­ny, inven­tive, touch­ing, hock­ey-obsessed (of course), and did I say fun­ny? Rich­ler seems always to be left out when crit­ics invoke the pan­theon of great twen­ti­eth-cen­tu­ry North Amer­i­can Jew­ish writ­ers. I can’t under­stand it. To my mind he’s at, or near, the very top. It’s arguable, of course. But for me, that list should include Rich­ler, along with Roth, Ozick, Mala­mud, Bel­low, and Paley.

Behind the Beau­ti­ful Fore­vers: Kather­ine Boo’s real-life por­trait of life in a Mum­bai slum is so psy­cho­log­i­cal­ly astute that, to use a back­hand­ed com­pli­ment I hate, it reads just like a nov­el. And it’s not just beau­ti­ful and per­cep­tive: it changed the way I think about poverty.

Among the Thugs: Bill Buford’s har­row­ing and hilar­i­ous account of his years infil­trat­ing England’s soc­cer hooli­gans. There is no more per­cep­tive writer on mat­ters of mob vio­lence and lager, ath­let­ic spec­ta­cle and gas­tric hero­ism — and none fun­nier. And his sen­tences: no one else writes sen­tences like these, so alive the pages crack­le. Buford is sui gener­is, a term most of the char­ac­ters in this book would not know.

Holy Days: In this pow­er­ful non­fic­tion tale about life inside the ultra-Ortho­dox com­mu­ni­ty, Lis Har­ris writes with deep insight, keen obser­va­tion, and sly humor about what was, when the project began, a world with which she was deeply unfa­mil­iar. Har­ris serves as the reader’s proxy, alter­nate­ly recep­tive and skep­ti­cal — and rid­ing shot­gun on her jour­ney is as enlight­en­ing as it is entertaining.

The Lost City of Z: David Grann is a top-notch reporter and a dynam­ic writer, but above all, he’s a sto­ry­teller of the first order. Whether he’s writ­ing about a man (wrong­ly?) con­vict­ed of arson, an art sleuth, or, as in this book, the search for a myth­i­cal Ama­zon­ian city, you sim­ply can’t not be inter­est­ed. Like the fear­some ani­mals that lurk in rivers forged by the book’s explor­ers, Grann yanks you in and nev­er lets go.

Chanan Tigay is an award-win­ning jour­nal­ist who has cov­ered the Mid­dle East, 9/11, and the Unit­ed Nations for numer­ous mag­a­zines, news­pa­pers, and wires. He is a pro­fes­sor of Cre­ative Writ­ing at San Fran­cis­co State University.

Relat­ed Content:

Chanan Tigay is an award-win­ning jour­nal­ist who has cov­ered the Mid­dle East, 9/11, and the Unit­ed Nations for numer­ous mag­a­zines, news­pa­pers, and wires. Born in Jerusalem, Tigay holds degrees from Colum­bia Uni­ver­si­ty and the Uni­ver­si­ty of Penn­syl­va­nia and was a recent Inves­tiga­tive Report­ing Fel­low at UC Berke­ley. He is a pro­fes­sor of Cre­ative Writ­ing at San Fran­cis­co State University.