Conspirators

Alan Riding

Bernstein, a literary critic with strong roots in Europe, is evidently in no hurry. He writes in an elegant and deliberately meandering style, as if confident of hypnotizing the reader with his baroque sentences, explorations of neuroses, intricate descriptions of palaces and hovels and astute reflections on money and power, class and race. Conspirators brings to mind books written a century ago, which seems just right for the era it portrays.
— The New York Times

The New Yorker

Bernstein’s first novel takes place just before the First World War, on the eastern frontier of the Austro-Hungarian Empire. Economic hardship and anti-Semitism have provoked unrest in the Jewish population, and Count-Governor Wiladowski, terrified of assassination, hires Jakob Tausk, an ex-rabbinical student, as a spy to protect him. Unbeknownst to him, Tausk is approached by a wealthy Jewish financier who has discovered that his only son is conspiring against the regime, and who worries about the radical influence of a mysterious rabbi with Messianic leanings. It’s perhaps inevitable that an epic conceived in such grandly old-fashioned terms contains some characters and scenes that seem well worn. But, as events rush toward a bloody resolution, Bernstein maintains firm control of his plot, and painstakingly re-creates the historical landscape in which an often reluctant Tausk undertakes his counter-revolutionary mission.

Publishers Weekly

Bernstein strives for the authority of a modernist classic in this complex and serious-minded first novel, which tells how the Jewish and Gentile upper classes of an eastern border town of the Austro-Hungarian Empire are riven by revolutionary passions on the eve of WWI. In 1913, various conspiracies brew to overthrow the current regime, locally represented by fearful and Machiavellian Count-Governor Wiladowski. Wiladowski is morbidly obsessed with the possibility of his own assassination; he hires ex-rabbinical student Jakob Tausk to keep an eye on the Jews under his dominion as a precaution. Meanwhile, wealthy and powerful local financier Moritz Rotenburg teams with Tausk to keep his son Hans out of trouble. It seems the impetuous young heir has been dabbling in radical politics as a means of rebellion against his old man. Moses Elch Brugger, a charismatic rabbi with a fire-and-brimstone messianic message, has also established himself in the area, and Tausk and the elder Rotenburg attempt to penetrate and subvert his flock. When Hans's plotting becomes entangled with Brugger's beguiling fanaticism, it seems the Jewish community-the true hero of the novel-is headed for political disaster. The various political and religious conspiracies come to a head during Passover and Easter weekend, as Wiladowski faces the assassination attempt he's so often dreaded. Bernstein weaves a rich tapestry of Jewish life in the twilight of the Hapsburg empire, though he lingers too lovingly over period details. Similarly, the life-and-death stakes the various characters face lose their urgency in long-winded digression and after-the-fact recounting. Although Bernstein's story never quite shrugs free of its weighty influences, the book is a solid and multifaceted first effort with a sure sense of its time and setting. (Apr.) Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information.

Library Journal

Bernstein's near-operatic debut opens in 1925, when Alexander Garber, a successful Austrian writer, learns of an old acquaintance's implication in the secret police. He decides to investigate the connection between Jakob Tausk and an incident that happened in his home province in April 1914 (called the Cathedral Square murders) and its five major players. His research takes him back to 1912, with World War I and the end of the Habsburg Empire nearing. Count Wiladowski, counsel-governor of Galicia, is sure someone is planning to assassinate him. He has hired Tausk, a Jew, to be the head of his secret police. Mortiz Rotenburg, a wealthy Jewish businessman, has used his financial success to build his own power base, giving him influence over most of the empire's aristocrats. His son rebels, forming a Marxist cell intent on overthrowing the ruling class. Finally, there is Brugger, a rabbi who preaches violence as a means of hurrying the Messiah's return. As these characters interact, using other people as pawns, tensions mount, culminating in bloody events that change all of their lives. Examining ethnic and class roles, violence and change, and the philosophical/psychological makeup of his characters, Bernstein, a contributor to such publications as the Times Literary Supplement, has created a multileveled literary thriller with implications that reverberate into today's headlines. Highly recommended.-Josh Cohen, Mid-Hudson Lib. Syst., Poughkeepsie, NY Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information.

Kirkus Reviews

Fear and suspicion drive the world of a group of Austrians in this dark, trenchant debut. In an extended prologue, set outside Salzburg in 1925, writer Alexander Garber ponders the twilight of the Hapsburg Empire. Particularly fascinating to Garber is the way the characters he then knew were "always completely absorbed in their own activities, oblivious of what their neighbors were doing, even if they are standing a few feet away . . . . " The story then flashes back to 1912 and to the Austrian village of Galicia. Here, Hans Rottenberg, son of wealthy Morris Rottenberg, joins with Asher Blumenthal and other young revolutionaries to form a terror cell that plots the assassination of Count-Governor Wiladowski at noon on Easter in Vienna. His security already threatened by the murder of a cousin, Wiladowski engages wily agent Jacob Tausk to spy on Rottenberg's cell and on the activities of union organizers. Wiladowski is also concerned by the arrival on the scene of a charismatic rabbi who preaches violence and who, his followers believe, may be the Messiah. The rabbi has also drawn the attention of Rottenberg pere, so that he, too, engages Tausk to assess the rabbi's intentions and influence. In a Machiavellian twist, Tausk thus becomes the spy of two masters. But point of view rather than action drives and dominates the narrative as it moves on in wide, sweeping circles that encompass an extended slate of self-absorbed characters. Young Rottenberg eyes clumsy compatriot Blumenthal with condescension. Wiladowski muses over his wife's distaste for Tausk. And Tausk negotiates the delicate role-and power-of a double agent. Ego and gunpowder combust in the strongly written assassination scene.Heavy going at times, but never ponderous. Bernstein's point of view is arresting, and his elaborate stylistic flourishes befit the era he describes.