The Finkler Question

Howard Jacobson · b. 1942 · England

Why it matters

A gentile Londoner mugged in the street finds himself bewilderingly eager to be Jewish, tangling grief, comedy, and the era's Israel-Palestine arguments together. Jacobson's Booker winner is one of the rare outright comic novels the prize has ever recognized.

At a glance

Dense comic riffing and philosophical digression slow an otherwise simple plot.