''The Last of the Just'' is a
post-war
In Western usage, the phrase post-war era (or postwar era) usually refers to the time since the end of World War II. More broadly, a post-war period (or postwar period) is the interval immediately following the end of a war. A post-war period c ...
novel by André Schwarz-Bart originally published in French (as ''Le Dernier des justes'') in 1959. It was published in an English translation by Stephen Becker in 1960. It was Schwarz-Bart's first book and won the Prix Goncourt, France's highest literary prize. The author was the son of a Polish Jewish family murdered by the Nazis and he based the story on History of the Jews in England (1066–1290)#Massacres at London and York (1189–1190), the massacre in York.
The story follows the "Just Men" of the Levy family over eight century, centuries. Each Just Man is a Tzadikim Nistarim, Lamed Vav, one of the thirty-six righteous souls whose existence justifies the purpose of humankind to God. Each "bear the world's pains... beginning with the execution of an ancestor in 12th-century York, England... culminat[ing] in the story of a schoolboy, Ernie, the last... executed at Auschwitz." It has been described as an enduring classic that reminds "how easily torn is the precious fabric of civilization, and how destructive are the consequences of dumb hatred-whether a society's henchmen are permitted to beat an Ernie Levy because he's Jewish, or because he's black or gay or Hispanic or homeless."
[MICHAEL DORRI]
Trust Me On This Remembering a Book of Remembering
September 15, 1991 page 2 Book Review Los Angeles Times
Gilbert Highet, a Book of the Month Club, Book-of-the-Month Club judge called it, "the saddest novel I have ever read, almost as sad as history."
References
{{DEFAULTSORT:Last of the Just, The
1959 French novels
French historical novels
Prix Goncourt winning works
1959 debut novels
Atheneum Books books