SOURCE: Abramson, Edward A. “The Assistant.” In Bernard Malamud Revisited, pp. 25-42. New York: Twayne Publishers, 1993.

In the following essay, Abramson discusses major themes and motifs in The Assistant, particularly asceticism and imprisonment, and the contrast between Judaic ethics and American materialism.

The Nature of Jewishness

Although it is only Malamud's second novel, The Assistant moves far beyond The Natural in skillfulness and, unlike the earlier novel, contains a strong Jewish theme. Throughout the tale, he uses the image of the Jew and the ethics of Judaism as a standard of behavior. As we have seen, however, his approach to Jewishness is not a parochial one, in that he casts it as a type of secular humanism, a moral code that all good people try to follow. The main characters, Frank Alpine and Morris Bober, carry the weight of the novel. Frank is shown to be imbibing “Jewish...