I want to start off by saying that Eddie Jaku is a badass human being. His holocaust story is straight out of Hollywood and he has continued to live an exemplary life as a survivor. It was very interesting reading his own memoir and I greatly respect him as a person.
That being said, I do have a few misgivings about the book, as evidenced by its rating. Rather than being a strict memoir, Eddie tries to take the book into self-help land by spinning each chapter as a cheesy “life lesson” (E.g. family is everything, love is the best medicine, make the world a better place). This is also the main problem I had with Tuesdays with Morrie. While I don’t deny the wisdom of my elders, I also don’t think rapid firing a bunch of life lessons at me is conducive to changing my mind. What’s more effective are:
-
Literature, by immersing me into a character and letting the lesson emerge organically (E.g. Crime and Punishment)
-
Persuasive non-fiction, by building arguments, presenting evidence, anticipating rebuttals, and presenting counter arguments (E.g. Four Thousand Weeks)
Furthermore, Eddie wrote this memoir at the age of 100 having only learned English after the war. A very impressive feat! But that does mean the writing itself was somewhat mediocre.
Don’t blame others for your misfortunes. No one has ever said that life is easy, but it is easier if you love it. If you hate your life, it becomes impossible to live.