Skip To Content
JEWISH. INDEPENDENT. NONPROFIT.

Triumphant Return With a New Novel

To a world that, despite his best-selling books and major movies of the millennium’s first decade, had moved on without him, Jonathan Safran Foer has recently announced, “Here I Am.”

In 2002, when Foer published his first novel, “Everything Is Illuminated,” at the age of 25, he earned a lot of attention. “Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close,” in 2005, made him a household name. Both novels were adapted for the silver screen, and Foer kept writing, publishing the nonfiction book “Eating Animals,” conceiving the half-novel-half-artwork “Tree of Codes” and editing a new Haggadah.

What he didn’t produce was another novel — that is, until now. In September, Foer, now 39, released his much-anticipated third novel, his first in 11 years: “Here I Am.” The gargantuan book, which covers the destruction of Israel and breakup of a Washington, D.C., couple’s marriage, earned mixed reviews. Speaking to the Forward in August, Foer mentioned that he’s questioned what actual value his work as a novelist brings to the world. With “Here I Am,” some critics and readers affirmed that value, while others, with varying degrees of aggravation, responded by encouraging more such questions.

Regardless of which side you took, what’s incontestable is that Foer is one of the most prominent American Jewish writers working today. At its heart, his work, which has a heterogeneous audience, engages with a scope of Jewish culture, history and practice and gives American Jews an insight into a part of their community. It also introduces each of those categories to a broader audience. It’s impossible to talk about contemporary American Jewish literature without talking about Foer, and for that, he deserves recognition.

The Forward is free to read, but it isn’t free to produce

I hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, I’d like to ask you to please support the Forward.

At a time when other newsrooms are closing or cutting back, the Forward has removed its paywall and invested additional resources to report on the ground from Israel and around the U.S. on the impact of the war, rising antisemitism and polarized discourse.

Readers like you make it all possible. We’ve started our Passover Fundraising Drive, and we need 1,800 readers like you to step up to support the Forward by April 21. Members of the Forward board are even matching the first 1,000 gifts, up to $70,000.

This is a great time to support independent Jewish journalism, because every dollar goes twice as far.

—  Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO

2X match on all Passover gifts!

Republish This Story

Please read before republishing

We’re happy to make this story available to republish for free, unless it originated with JTA, Haaretz or another publication (as indicated on the article) and as long as you follow our guidelines.
You must comply with the following:

  • Credit the Forward
  • Retain our pixel
  • Preserve our canonical link in Google search
  • Add a noindex tag in Google search

See our full guidelines for more information, and this guide for detail about canonical URLs.

To republish, copy the HTML by clicking on the yellow button to the right; it includes our tracking pixel, all paragraph styles and hyperlinks, the author byline and credit to the Forward. It does not include images; to avoid copyright violations, you must add them manually, following our guidelines. Please email us at [email protected], subject line “republish,” with any questions or to let us know what stories you’re picking up.

We don't support Internet Explorer

Please use Chrome, Safari, Firefox, or Edge to view this site.