The Education of Arnold Hitler

(Paperback)

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At once a chess master, a linguist, an athlete and an innocent in love, Arnold passes through the racial tensions of Mansfield, Texas (home of the author of Black Like Me) in the 1950s, the anti-war movement at Harvard, and both the Upper East Side and the Bowery, meeting Noam Chomsky, Al Gore, and Leonard Bernstein in the process, and finally learning the meaning of meaning.

Reviews

"In this smart, dense, cartoonish second novel from the author of "Insect Dreams," a young Texan with a poisoned name comes of age on a countercultural tour of America, from sputnik to Watergate, with stops at a cross-burning, Harvard and the grassy knoll. Young Arnold meets Chomsky, gets French kissed by Leonard Bernstein and finally marries his own Eva Braun beneath the Bruckner Expressway...Estrin is consistently learned and funny..."--The New York Times Book Review "A lively, entertaining read with several scenes that could win O. Henrys on their own." --THE SAN FRANCISCO CHRONICLE "An unusually rich work of fiction."--Jewish Book World "A brilliant meditation on the power of words...a richly multilayered coming-of-age story in which the hero struggles with the power of language and naming, the ambiguities of religious identity, the meaning of meaning and the nature of alienation...Part Huck Finn, part Eugene Gant ("Look Homeward, Angel"), part Oskar Matzerath ("The Tin Drum"), part Holden Caulfield and part Herman Melville's Billy Budd, little Arnold Hitler makes his way from innocence to experience as he moves from the security of his small Texas town to the uncertain and often anxious world of Harvard during the Vietnam War protests and finally to the hustling world of the Bowery...[an] ingenious novel of ideas."--The Atlanta Journal Constitution "A lively, sure-footed tale... the novel's ruminations on linguistic expression are perhaps best served by Estrin's deft touch of magic realism: Arnold communicates with his maternal grandfather in Italy by speaking to him through his left knee, like a sort of two-way radio. Their connection, at once telepathic and corporeal, offers the integrity of a shared heritage to counter the rhetorical sway of Arnold's unfortunate last name. When the path of Arnold's education leads him to determine not only what he will be called but who he will be, it is the words that come from within him that prove most decisive." --BOOKFORUM "Estrin combines the black comedy of Don DeLillo with a bit of Tom Robbins's intellectual adventurousness to concoct a wildly provocative tale of a young man who must learn to define himself. Highly recommended." --LIBRARY JOURNAL, STARRED "As if the name Arnold Hitler wasn't baggage enough, the protagonist of this sweet, playful coming-of-age story carries a bit of Forrest Gump in him, too. Though the timbre of Arnold's intellect is richer than Forrest's, they're equally earnest. And as Arnold strikes out from small-town Texas to Harvard and New York City in the 1960s and early '70s, he keeps encountering historic figures... this clever narrative package also makes plenty of room for literate explorations of Jewishness, anti-Semitism, and serious games of "What's in a name" --BOOKLIST "This is more like what Forrest Gump could have been, had it been written with more skill, style and a gimlet eye toward satire."--Ruminator Magazine "Marc Estrin's all-American Bildungsroman, with its winning New World hero with the worst of all possible Old World names, conjures the recent history of these United States with the gusto of a wild West wind. The Education of Arnold Hitler is a picaresque novel of comic sweep and intellectuals depth, an inspired complement to the equally inspired Insect Dreams." --Peter Glassgold, author of The Angel Max "[A] splendid satire."--The Vermont Review of Books "Estrin blends a heady and potent brew of fact and fiction with real and imaginary characters and uses it as a vivid backdrop for Arnold's heroic journey. With wit, brio, and a keen sense of the absurd, he has fashioned a novel that is pure comic genius shot through with intelligence and style."--The Barnes & Noble Discover Great New Writers Program "[An] intelligent, erudite novel. There is not a page without brilliant -- and often very funny -- remarks."--Magill Book Reviews