BOOKS

When
Push
Comes To
Shove

How Chutzpah made its way to the top of
the best-seller list.

DANIEL SCHIFRIN

Special to The Jewish News

T

"nersitolvitz
leversal of Fortune

Author il

he most unlikely pub-
lishing success of the
year is a rambling ana-
lysis of Jewish assertiveness
with a Yiddish title, whose
target audience, at best, con-
stitutes 2 percent of the
population.
Twenty-three weeks so far
on the New York Times
best-seller list, including a
four-week stint at No. 1?
That's Chutzpah.
Literally.
How could it happen?
Let us count the ways:
Self-promotion, controversy,
hype and a powerful mes-
sage that strikes a chord
with many American Jews.
In short, it's got everything
but sex. And it undoubtedly
is the most talked about
Jewish book in years.
It's not that books by
Jewish authors don't sell.
Mailer, Roth and Bellow are
just some of the authors
whose work has floated

around best-seller lists for
years.
But Chutzpah is non-
fiction, not an engrossing
novel. Yet so far, 200,000
people have plunked down
$22.95 for a book which
chronicles the Jewish devel-
opment of Alan Dershowitz
and then tells Jews, essen-
tially, that they should be
more like him — proud to be
a Jew and an American.
No one doubts that Mr.
Dershowitz is one of the
most effective self-
promoters around. Almost
everyone has an opinion
about him, and his face
seems to pop up everywhere.
"Dershowitz is as much a
media celebrity as a brilliant
legal attorney," said
Genevieve Stuttaford, non-
fiction editor for Publisher's
Weekly. "He gets a lot of
coverage on TV, and he is an
instantly recognizable fig-
ure."
Publicity stunts like plac-
ing an ad in the New York
Times protesting the pa-
per's review of a book about

THE DETROIT JEWISH NEWS

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