Rating: 
Summary: The Chosen
Review: The chosen by Chaim Potok is a novel that traces the development of a young protagonist. What makes the chosen so different from other books is its focus on the development of two main characters instead of one. While the story is told through the point of view Reuven Malter, Danny Saunders is an integral part of the plot. They are both Jewish teens growing up in New York City during the time of World War Two. However, Reuven is the son of a more modern, open-minded man, while Danny Saunders is the son of a strict Hasidic rabbi.
The story begins at a baseball game with Reuven's team playing against Danny's team. When Danny steps to bat he hits the ball straight into Reuven's face, shattering his glasses and sending him to the hospital. Danny visits Reuven in the hospital and at first Reuven doesn't want to talk to Danny, but eventually the two of them overcome their differences and become friends. Their friendship faces many obstacles, including prejudice from both sects of Jews, but Danny and Reuven stay close, even through a period where they are literally not allowed to speak to each other. This friendship is an essential part of the story and is used to show how people from different backgrounds can accept each other's differences and use them to grow as individuals.
Religion is another major part of the story and is consistently used as a means of showing the similarities and differences between Danny and Reuven. Danny's father wants his son to take over as tzaddik, or leader of the Hasidic community when he gets old enough. While Reuven's father is less strict about what he wants his son to do and will except and decision he makes. The friendship between them helps each boy do what they want to do and not allow religion or their father's to decide their fate.
The theme of sight is an important one in this book. When Reuven is hit in the eye, he first begins to look beyond the strange appearance of the Hasidic Jews and let go of his prejudice. Potok stresses the importance of looking beyond appearances and accepting people as they are.
Rating:
Summary: insightful novel
Review: Chaim Potok's emotional heart-warming story The Chosen captivates its readers from page one. The intense ball game grabs the reader and involves him in the lives of Reuven and Danny from the start. Potok knows how to hold the reader's attention and concern him with the day-to-day happenings in both boys' lives. The historical events show accurate reactions toward events such as D-day rejoicing and pure sock after President Roosevelt's death. Every character has a role; there weren't any extra personalities to detract from the main action of the book. Potok introduces the different beliefs among the Jewish sects and helps the reader to better understand the religion and its affect on father son relationships. Reuven and Danny's friendship strengthens as they come to realize that their father's way of doing things isn't always the only right way.
Danny and Reuven's friendship get them through some of their toughest ordeals. It is even able to survive the ban set by Reb. Saunders. True friendship stands the tests of time. I know that when I need advice or support, my true friends are there to help me though whatever problems I'm having, even if they don't live in the same state. This novel has helped me realize how important real friendships can be.
This book is highly recommended for those looking for a compelling insightful novel. It is great for anyone struggling with a friendship because it helps the reader to realize how important friendships are. The friendship between Danny and Reuven gets stronger through each hardship they go though.
Rating: 
Summary: In a Different Light
Review: The book was very inspiring and motivational. It was very hard to read. It took a very long time to get into the book. I almost gave up reading it but I had to see why other reviews that I read spoke so highly of it. Once I finished the book I realize why. It was about true friendship and how it can last through anything. It was also about a young man and his thirst for knowledge, and the lengths he had to go to to reach his final happiness. It inspired to to follow my dreams, and decide my future for myself.
Rating:
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: The Chosen
Review: Sometimes a tragic occurrence can be the catalyst that sparks a bond of friendship between two people of dissimilar backgrounds. This is demonstrated aptly in Chaim Potok's novel, The Chosen, first published in 1967. In this outstanding book, two fifteen year old boys, Reuven Malter, the son of a secular Jewish professor, and Daniel Saunders, the son of the Rabbi leader of a very conservative Russian Hasidic sect, confront each other on the baseball field. The lives of these two boys and their families are forever altered when Daniel hits Reuven in the eye with a line drive shot, nearly blinding him. At first Reuven feels terrible contempt toward Daniel, but in time the boys grow to understand and respect each other and there develops a bond between them that overcomes their significant differences. The story takes place in Williamsburg, Brooklyn, starting in 1944 when World War II is coming to an end and the full tragedy of the holocaust is being discovered. It follows the lives of the two boys as they finish their studies at Yeshiva and go onto Jewish college together. Reuven learns about the very different upbringing of his friend when he moves in with Daniel's family for a few weeks while Reuven's father is away. He learns that Daniel's father does not speak to his son except during prayer services, and only then to test him on his knowledge of the Talmud. Reuven learns that Daniel is expected to follow in the family tradition and inherit his father's position as head Rabbi of his sect. But he also learns that Daniel has different desires and is torn by his loyalty to his father. "Reb Saunders's son is a terribly torn and lonely boy", Reuven's father explains. "There is literally no one in the world he can talk to. He needs a friend. The accident with the baseball has bound him to you, and he has already sensed in you someone he can talk to without fear." The story is told through the eyes of Reuven. Through his eyes we experience the difficulties of trying to comprehend another culture so different from one's own, and we see the growth of Reuven's understanding of Reb Saunders and his approach to parenting. Reuven also learns that possibly there is a greater purpose to seemingly random events. As his father explains, "Reuven, as you grow older you will discover that the most important things that will happen to you will often come as a result of silly things, as you call them-'ordinary things' is a better expression. That is the way the world is." This book is a compelling novel that tells a story of growth and understanding and the meaning of true friendship. I recommend it.
Rating:
Summary: The Chosen, Awesome read.
Review: I first received this book a couple weeks ago from my English 2 Preap teacher, since I'm a 10th grader, I didn't think much of it. When I started reading the story, it caught my eye about the friendship that was built around two complete opposites of "the world" per say. Then I became slightly confused with the story, not sure what it was trying to tell me, and I went in search of answers to my question. "What was this book truely about?" I found it out while talking with other students and teachers that had read the book and all found it interesting. Only one source truely helped me and I found inspiration in the story, though many still ask me what it was. Heh...I can't truely say what the moral of the story conveys, I believe you can only understand when you read it for yourself. It is worth it, definietly.
Rating: 
Summary: Fiction for the Soul
Review: I only heard of this book recently, here into my third decade of life, and that's a shame really. When certain books hit you during certain stages of life the impact can be profound. This one missed me by a few stages. "A Separate Peace" hit me during the early teens (a perfect time also to tackle "The Chosen"), Catch-22 upon entering college, recently "Underworld." The point I'm laboriously arriving at is that "The Chosen" is indeed a great book, but I wish I would have read it at fourteen. Its message would have been more poignant and internalized then (not that it was entirely lost on a grown up child of today though). The real strength of Potok's book lies in three areas. First, the insight the reader gets into the American Jewish sub-culture of Hasidim and Orthodox at a critical point in history for Jews (1940's) is truly elevated. Second, the strong characterization between four very different individuals reveals a beautiful relationship development between father and son, friend and friend, and growing young men encountering the world. Third, it reaches out for the soul and stays true to things that matter; a search for spirituality, a tolerance for beliefs, a search for a place in this world (for individuals and cultures), and a search for knowledge. The writing overall was simplistic and the reader is handed many things on a silver platter that could have been presented more subtle, more artistically. Another thing, Sigmund Freud lurks in a mystical "portent of doom" shroud when the character Danny starts to study him. It is never really explained why the other characters in the book have such a fear of Freud. What the reader sees is that Danny is studying Freud and the rest of the characters know for certain bad things will befall to his tainted mind. Despite these inconsequential distractions, the story, search for meaning, and character interplay more than make up for it. I think I would have given this a 4.5 stars if allowed, but I'm leaning towards 5, baby, cuz more stars are better than less. Give this book to a teen and help them learn tolerance. It's fundamentally important--now more than ever.
Rating:
Summary: One of the best books I've ever read
Review: This book explores the friendship that develops between two Jewish boys in New York City during the Second World War. I loved it for it's beautiful story and how it weaves together the very different lives of the boys, their relationships with their fathers, and the eventual interactions of all four of the characters. Potok includes numerous desriptions of Jewish tradition and customs, which is vital to the story as well as fascinating information. I found myself seeking to learn more about the Jewish faith when I finished this book. The plot is complex in how it balances the characters and their lives, all while teaching the reader about the various sects of Judaism. At the same time, it is told in beautiful language that is very easy to understand and appreciate. The entire book is muted and wonderfully understated, and it feels like you are listening to an old man recount his youth in a soft yet spirited voice. Potok's book "The Promise" follows up the story of "The Chosen" nicely, but the first book in the sequence is by far the best. At times tragic, jubilant, and thoughtful, this is by far one of the best books I have ever read, if not THE best. I feel like I'm a better person for it. Everyone should have a chance to read this book.
Rating:
Summary: It deserves its designation as a classic
Review: I hadn't touched a copy of this book in thirty years, but I remember it with great fondness. And when I saw a stage production of this novel with Theodore Bikel as Reb Saunders, I felt I had to pick up a copy and reread it. This is the story of two boys growing up within the same religion, but with vastly different backgrounds, in a world that has become part of history, but which has not faded from the minds of men. Reuven Malter and Danny Saunders are, each in their own way, trying to become active members of the post-Holocaust world they find themselves in. Reuven has an easier time of it because of his father's opinions on the course world Jewry must take; Danny has a much more difficult time, because of his father's opinions on that same subject. Danny is also hampered because of his father's expectations for him, while Reuven's father is more accepting of his son's intentions. Potok takes these basic points and fashions a powerful story that comes along only once in a lifetime. In this case, twice in a lifetime - because its sequel, "The Promise", is every bit as good as "The Chosen".
Rating:
Summary: Good.
Review: We had to read 'The Chosen' for a class in my senior year in high school. It is a good book about two Jewish boys growing up during World War II. One should definately read it, but the subject matter is a little dry.
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