Singer has a special gift for observing the ways in which people make their own hell. As the tension escalates, Yasha considers renouncing the world altogether: Perhaps he would be better off in a sealed prison, far, far from the temptations of the flesh. His relentless urge to explore results in a sordid encounter with the world of sex trafficking. He discovers that one of his paramours has been driven to suicidal extremes. Yasha’s problems are serious, at first, and later they are overwhelming. Within minutes, Yasha can veer from contentment to despair: Should he leave his wife? Should he be happy with what he has and force himself to surrender his destructive, delightful, maddening sexual freedom? He sleeps with Magda, his assistant he sleeps with a woman of ill repute who might be a whore he sleeps with a beautiful, new acquaintance, and he eyes this new woman’s adolescent daughter. He has a mostly tolerable marriage and an interesting job he has food and talent, and a wife who is willing to forgive his many dalliances.
Yasha is torn between the demands of fidelity and the urge to explore the world. It argues for a slower, more thoughtful way of life it seems to say, “Notice the world and thank God, thank someone, for the miracle that is your own frustrating, difficult life.” What is a man’s obligation to the people he loves? Is freedom a curse or a blessing? How should anyone go about designing and enacting a useful, happy life? Singer’s trademark empathy and sense of wonder turn this novel into something more than an odd, idiosyncratic, fictional biography. As Yasha’s problems multiply, the tone of the novel becomes very dark, and Singer raises several troubling questions. In The Magician of Lublin, Nobel laureate Isaac Bashevis Singer tells the story of Yasha, a talented man who simply cannot control himself.
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