Analysis of The Chosen by Chaim Potok

A detailed Summary of Analysis of The Chosen by Chaim Potok

The Chosen by Chaim Potok is set in the 1940's neighborhood of Brooklyn in Williamsburg. Two boys who live a few blocks from each other but in totally different environments forge a unique relationship. Reuven Malter, the son of an Orthodox Jewish scholar, and Danny Saunders, the brilliant son of a great Hasidic rabbi, meet for the first time in a baseball game between their two Jewish parochial schools.

Reuven is hit in the eye with a ball hit by Danny and is kept in bed for almost a month. During this time, Reuven befriends Danny as he constantly visits him due to his guilt about almost blinding Reuven. Danny comes to the hospital to chat with Reuven and occasionally talk about the war or his study of the Talmud. When Reuven gets out of the hospital, Danny brings him to his home for Shabbat and to meet his father. Reuven is overwhelmed by his father's calm and stern manner of speaking to his son. Reuven finds out that Danny must become a rabbi and cannot become a psychologist like he wants.

Reuven and Danny grow older and they get into the same college. Due to Reuven's father support for the creation of a Jewish state, Danny's father, who thinks a Jewish state can only be created whe

Reb Saunders is very narrow-minded as to the future of his son, Danny. He simply wants Danny to get his smicha and become a tzaddik. Danny has a great mind and wants to use it to study psychology, not to become a Hasidic tzaddik. Reuven also feels sorry for Danny. There is a very symbolic scene where he is sitting on his porch, and sees a fly trapped in a spider's web and is about to get eaten. Reuven blows on the fly, first softly, and then more harshly, and the fly is free. This is represents how Reuven wants to free Danny from the "filmy, almost invisible strands of the web"(p.165), a metaphor of Reb Saunders that has Danny somewhat captured and expects him to become a tzaddik. But in the end, Reb Saunders finds out that Danny has secretly gone to the library to study Freud, the pioneer of psychoanalysis and says, " 'Today my Daniel is free.' "(p.268), allowing him to become a psychologist.

"The liquid streams of racing children, the noisy chatter of long-sleeved women, the worn buildings and blotched banisters, the garbage cans...gave me the feeling of having slid silently across a strange threshold...I regretted having let Danny take me into his world...I felt myself naked fragile, an intruder.(p.115-116)" Reuven is very uncomfortable in this totally new environment, but as they become better friends, he goes to Dan

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Approximate Word count = 902
Approximate Pages = 4 (250 words per page double spaced)

Category: English

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Analysis of The Chosen by Chaim Potok

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