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Summary: Pleasing to the mind as well as the heart !!!!
Review: " Touching and sentimental, all together one of my favorite novels. The journeys and paths Reuven and Danny had to take really hit home. It had so much to do with real life, and there were so many things I could realate to; Jewish or not I felt that The Chosen focussed on life in general. The Jewish society, picayune to some and important to others, is finally "unmasked" and everything you wanted to know is finally being told. I found that by reading this book my eyes were opened and I saw a whole new world filled with strength and wisdom. Chaim Potok gave me something I can carry with me through my experiences yet to come. Fresh and mature, I would recommend this book to ANYONE interested in finding the truths of our society that are concealed in Potoks writings pertaining to Orthodox and Russian Hasidic Jewish cultures. Read this book and I garauntee you will be given the same gift that will open your eyes and your heart to Jewish beliefs and the strengths in friendship. "
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Summary: Chaim's Chosen Catches 1st Rank Slot
Review: Chaim Potok's epic tale is of two boys who struggle through their years of friendship, threatened by their different branches of Judaism. Both boys' fathers play important roles in their communities, even the world. But the emphasized importance they had on their childrens lives and each others is astronomical. Little things can be of great importance, true, but this point is accentuated almost too often, and too much, for that matter. Some points tend to hang on things for excessively long times.
Despite this, the story was sensational. Great for all ages, it throws different elements in the mixture- a little history here, dash of fiction there.... This tends to spruce up the story and pick up the slower, more uneventful points, making the read much more enjoyable. I have no doubts that 'The Chosen' is one of, if not THE most phenomenal books of its time.
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Summary: The Vision of the Chosen
Review: The Chosen is either loved or hated by those who read it. In my English class, we read this book, and I really was the only one who had a neutral stance on it. The story is about two young Jewish adolescents from very different backgrounds living in Brooklyn with their two fathers. I suppose I shall list PROS and CONS I have found with this book.PROS: Very insightful about relationships, discrimination, the power of religion, and different branches of Judaism. Characters you can sympathize with. CONS: Slow moving and tedious to the less keen reader, and some of the characters are too easy to dislike (until you get to know them and their motives a little better). Well, I think this was a good enough book. Go out to your local library and give and give it a chance!
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Summary: The Pang of Love
Review: For those that want something different from the usual love stories that could possibly never be true, action movies with impossible moves made by just about the cutest guys on the planet, and the most blood chilling horror movies, Chaim Potok's "The Chosen" offers a different concept of entertainment. Although it is based upon the story of two teenage boys and the special friendship that they share, it is built upon the foundation of Judaism. If you want to learn more about the Jewish culture, "The Chosen" would be perfect for you. But it's not only a religious experience because Potok knits into the explanations of certain Jewish sects, problems that teenagers would commonly encounter in their lives. The ability to relate to these teenage characters' lives and by the descriptive ways Potok present their teenage life story drew me into the story and will draw you into it too. Potok cleverly used the characters to heighten the reality of the story and helps you feel like your actually one of the characters. It's a great book to read when you're having problems with your parents because it helps you realize how great the bond between parents and their children are no matter what one might be going through with one's parents. And when the sons or fathers cry and their hearts ache for one another, you feel it in your heart too because you can relate to it... the painful yet sweet pang of love that occurs within the relationships of close friends and family.
Rating:
Summary: Very Enjoyable to read
Review: I read this book last year because my mom suggested to me. I started to read it at first and slighty after the baseball part I got bored. Then A few months later I picked up the book and read it again and found that it was very intresting. Being a reformed jew I found that I acutally did not realate much to the hasidic and othordox jews. I did however know the terms and I did not find it difficult to read. I do not understand how people could find this book boring and I think that if they would of given the book a chance they would of enjoyed this book.
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Summary: Moving.
Review: The word "moving" is overused, but in the end I was was moved by this book. I found the first half of the book rather dull, but the second half was very emotional and even exciting at some points. The book is obviously not perfect. Potok uses his literary devices too blatantly at times. Sometimes he does not fully explain concepts that would be confusing to someone without prior knowledge of Jewish culture or practice. Overall, _The Chosen_ is an effective story of friendship and of the Jewish confrontation with modernity.
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Summary: This was a great book!
Review: The book The Chosen is a classic story about friendship and discovering what kind of a person you are inside. The setting is New York City, in two Jewish neighborhoods during World War II. The two main characters, Reuven and Danny, meet each other after Danny smacks a hit off Reuven's eye in a baseball game. Reuven is angry at first, but after encouragement from his father, he and Danny become friends. Reuven is then invited to Danny's house to study the Talmud with Reb Saunders, Danny's father and the tzaddik or leader of the Hassidic Jews in the area. Although Mr. Saunders doesn't agree with Reuven and his father's views, he permits the friendship. While Reuven is a bright boy, Danny is brilliant and "one in a million". He is, however, plagued by the fact that his father never speaks to him as part of his preparation to inherit the position of tzaddik. Danny would rather pursue a career in psychology, but he is terrified of telling this to his father.
Years pass and both boys are attending a Jewish college together. Everything is going smoothly until Reuven's father leads a rally in the city promoting Palestine as a Jewish state. Reb Saunders is enraged that his son is friends with someone whose father believes in such things. He tells his son never to speak with Reuven again and threatens to pull him out of college if he disobeys. After two years, the silence ban is lifted and Mr. Saunders shocks Danny by announcing that he knows about Danny's wishes to go to psychology school and he agrees to pay his way. Both Danny and Reuven are thrilled and everything ends happily.
All four of the main characters in this story were extremely plausible and well rounded. They had strong opinions about their faith and were overwhelmed at times by the complexity of life. Both fathers had good intentions, but struggled at times with the magnitude of raising a son and juggling their jobs. I enjoyed the style of the book because it was in first person as Reuven told it. I was able to see inside Reuven's mind and understand the struggles in his relationship with Danny and his father. I don't think that I would have enjoyed the book as much if it had been in third person. This story has a very strong theme, which can be linked to almost any friendship that anyone, anywhere, will ever have in life. The main theme is that strong friendships, no matter how complex or troubling, are very important in life. Both Danny and Reuven learned so much from each other and they became much better people because of that. A smaller theme is that you should never judge a person when you haven't met them and spent real, quality time with them. Reuven was so angry with Danny for hitting him that their great friendship almost never took place.
I felt that Chaim Potok did an excellent job with this story. He molds the life of young Jewish boys at that time with a compelling and compassionate tale of a friendship that will last a lifetime. He explored the characters' minds and their feelings toward life in general. However, I felt that the story was a little predictable and that once you were led down a path, the story continued that way. There were few shocking twists in the story. Also, I felt that there was little suspense or action in the first few chapters. The story starts fairly slowly compared to later chapters. It would have been nice also, if the boys' school life had been explored in greater detail as there was never even a classmate's name mentioned anywhere in the story. Lastly, I wish that more had been foreshadowed in the end about Danny's brother's future. Levi seems to be the one to inherit the tzaddik title even though he seems gravely ill at times with an unnamed illness.
Overall, this is a great story that I would recommend to anyone. It really makes you think about life and the importance of those close to you.
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Summary: CHOSE IS AMAZING
Review: THIS IS THE MOST BEAUTIFUL NOVEL I'VE EVER READ
CONGRATULATIONS TO MR. POTOK
NOW THAT I've FINISHED READING THE BOOK,
I MISS REUVEN, DANNY, REB SAUNDERS AND THE REST OF CHARACTERS.
I RECOMMEND THIS BOOK TO ALL JEWS.
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Summary: A Test of Friendship and Loyalty
Review: The Chosen was a great book, written by a great author. I finished this book in a matter of two weeks and I am still thinking about it. The book was so good, at night before I went to bed at night I thought I would read a chapter. That didn't always work out, I would just keep going through chapters, until I realized that it was close to eleven o'clock or sometimes even midnight. The book was so good I couldn't put it down. I found I liked Chaim Potok's way of descriptive writing, explaining every aspect of the novel and every scene in geat detail, not seeming to miss anything, or leave anything untouched. At the beginning of the book, you see a great example of this within the first few pages. After that its just captivating. Some parts were really heart-wrenching and others were intense, such as in the baseball game in the beginning of the novel. Chaim Potok makes you feel what the characters are feeling and makes you want to get back at the person whose hurting them, in some way, but you can't because its just a book. A great example of this is Danny's "evil" father, or so I thought until the end, when he explained his ways, and everything came into perspective, like pieces of a puzzle falling into place evenly and smoothly. I really like Mr. Potok's way of writing and will probably be reading another one of his novel's very soon. You can tell in his writing that he likes the subjects that he is talking about, and that he does a lot of research on them, or that he is just very well informed about the topics that he speaks of. That is what makes his writing even more unique.
Rating: 
Summary: A Fair Quality Book
Review: The book had a different subject than from what am used to. I had to read it for 8th grade English and about quarter of the class enjoyed it. It was very into the Jewish religion, however, many people didn't know much about it and found it sometimes difficult to understand. The main subject seemed to be the physical silences between charcters that occurred throughout the novel. Many different silences occur through different events in the plot, as different family views get in the way of a friendship. It was a novel that was a bit difficult to understand, and not the best plot I have ever read.
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