The Forty Days of Musa Dagh - Softcover

Werfel

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0881846686 ISBN 13: 9780881846683

Publisher: Da Capo Press, 1993

Synopsis

This stirring, poignant novel, based on real historical events that made of actual people true heroes, unfolds the tragedy that befell the Armenian people in the dark year of 1915. The Great War is raging through Europe, and in the ancient, mountainous lands southwest of the Caspian Sea the Turks have begun systematically to exterminate their Christian subjects. Unable to deny his birthright or his people, one man, Gabriel Bagradianâ born an Armenian, educated in Paris, married to a Frenchwoman, and an officer doing his duty as a Turkish subject in the Ottoman armyâ will strive to resist death at the hands of his blood enemy by leading 5,000 Armenian villagers to the top of Musa Dagh, â the mountain of Moses.â There, for forty days, in the face of almost certain death, they will suffer the siege of a Turkish army hell-bent on genocide. A passionate warning against the dangers of racism and scapegoating, and prefiguring the ethnic horrors of World War II, this important novel from the early 1930s remains the only significant treatment, in fiction or nonfiction, of the first genocide in the twentieth centuryâ s long series of inhumanities. It also continues to be today what the New York Times deemed it in 1933â â a true and thrilling novel ... a story which must rouse the emotions of all human beings.â â Musa Dagh gives us a lasting sense of participation in a stirring episode of history.... Magnificent.â â The New York Times Book Review â A novel full of the breath, the flesh and blood and bone and spirit of life.â â Saturday Review

About this title

About the Author:

Franz Werfel (1890 1945) was a Czech-born poet, playwright, and novelist. His writing focused on religion, heroism, and human brotherhood, as seen in the popular novel, The Song of Bernadette.

Language Notes:

Text: English
Original Language: German

About this edition

• Publisher: Da Capo Press
• Publication date: 1993
• ISBN 10: 0881846686
• ISBN 13: 9780881846683
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 824