An Orphan in History - by Paul Cown (Paperback)

About the Book

After growing up as a fully assimilated Jew, Paul Cowan embarks upon a journey to discover and appreciate his true identity and heritage, traveling a path from his Park Avenue home to nineteenth-century Lithuania to a contemporary Israeli kibbutz.

Book Synopsis

After growing up as a fully assimilated Jew, Paul Cowan embarks upon a journey to discover and appreciate his true identity and heritage, traveling a path from his Park Avenue home to nineteenth-century Lithuania to a contemporary Israeli kibbutz.

Review Quotes

"A deeply moving and very well-written account of a personal twentieth-century odyssey." -Chaim Potok "More than the story of a life; it is the story of an experience.... At a time when many are seeking answers in all sorts of paths-religious, mystical and political-Paul Cowan managed to find them, and himself, in his own history." -Richard F. Shepard, New York Times "Beautiful and moving.... An Orphan in Historywill interest hyphenated Americans of every variety." -Charles Silberman, New York Times Book Review "The rest of us have caught up with Cowan. More than ever we need his provocative story of the tension between the desire to be an American and the compulsion to be a Jew." -Lee Meyerhoff Hendler, author of The Year Mom Got Religion: One Woman's Midlife Journey into Judaism