Stranger in My Own Country: A Jewish Family in Modern Germany

<p><b>A moving and unsettling exploration of a young man's formative years in a country still struggling with its past</b><br><b></b></p><p>As a Jew in postwar Germany, Yascha Mounk felt like a foreigner in his own country. When he mentioned that he is Jewish, some made anti-Semitic jokes or talked about the superiority of the Aryan race. Others, sincerely hoping to atone for the country's past, fawned over him with a forced friendliness he found just as alienating.<br> Vivid and fascinating, <i>Stranger in My Own Country</i> traces the contours of Jewish life in a country still struggling with the legacy of the Third Reich and portrays those who, inevitably, continue to live in its shadow. Marshaling an extraordinary range of material into a lively narrative, Mounk surveys his countrymen's responses to &quot;the Jewish question.&quot; Examining history, the story of his family, and his own childhood, he shows that anti-Semitism and far-right extremism have long coexisted with self-conscious philo-Semitism in postwar Germany. <br> But of late a new kind of resentment against Jews has come out in the open. Unnoticed by much of the outside world, the desire for a &quot;finish line&quot; that would spell a definitive end to the country's obsession with the past is feeding an emphasis on German victimhood. Mounk shows how, from the government's pursuit of a less &quot;apologetic&quot; foreign policy to the way the country's idea of the <i>Volk</i> makes life difficult for its immigrant communities, a troubled nationalism is shaping Germany's future.</p>