Mendelssohn Is On The Roof

Rather than attempting to present a single vision of the holocaust jiri weil instead approaches it from a multitude of perspectives exploring its complexity through a range of characters.

Mendelssohn is on the roof.

Unfortunately this is the statue of wagner. Mendelssohn is on the roof is a novel by jiří weil written in 1959 and first translated into english by marie winn in 1991. Weil demonstrates how the simplest things in life eating seeing the sunlight breathing fresh air became the most complex and dangerous things in life and took people to. How safety and protection are never guaranteed no matter what people believe or have been told or convince themselves.

Unsure which among the decorative statues is mendelssohn he tells his men to remove the statue with the biggest nose. The book took 15 years to write. Julius schlesinger aspiring ss officer has received orders to remove from the roof of prague s concert hall the statue of the jewish composer felix mendelssohn. We see how quickly individuals turn against each other feel forced or reduced to report others.

But which of the figures adorning. Mendelssohn on the roof. They do not know who the composer is and decide to pull down the statue with the largest nose who they luckily discover at the last moment is wagner a great german composer. Mendelssohn is on the roof opens with the story of a group of men trying to obey heydrich s command to remove the statue of jewish composer mendelssohn from the roof of a building in prague.

Mendelssohn is on the roof is as much a series of linked short stories as a novel. Mendelssohn is on the roof copyrighted after his death in 1959 and translated to english in 1991 is a series of fictional intertwined cameos of life under the nazis for jews and czechs in prague and czechoslovakia during the nazi occupation from 1938 through 1942. It is an exploration of the many forms of corruption in nazi occupied czechoslovakia and embeds historical events such as the assassination of reinhard heydrich in prague in 1942 among fictional stories concerning the holocaust nazi careerism and the rise of nazism. It is impossible to read mendelssohn is on the roof and not be touched by the plight of the central characters and appalled and confused at the barbarism they faced.