Though Night Lessons in Little Jerusalem is set during the Holocaust, it is not about the Holocaust, according to screenwriter-turned novelist Rick Held.
The novel’s teenage protagonist, Tholdi, is an amalgam of Held’s father and his father’s first cousin, an internationally renowned conductor.
‘‘I think the Holocaust has been extensively covered in terms of the horror of concentration camps and genocide to the point where I think there’s perhaps an overload,’’ says the now Melbourne-based Held. ‘‘This is about the relationship triangle between the hero, Tholdi, his boss, who is a Nazi collaborator, and the bosses’ mistress.’’
While Held refers to 16-year-old Tholdi both in the book, and in our interview, as a ‘‘hero’’, this seems more a cliche of screenwriting than a fair and nuanced description of a character whose integrity is challenged by the need to survive and his infatuation with the collaborator’s mistress.
‘‘It’s a universal story about obsessive love,’’ says Held. ‘‘It’s also a coming-of-age story that addresses love, sex and relationships.’’
Though this is Held’s first novel, he has had a long career as a TV screenwriter. In the 1980s he joined Crawford Productions and later Channel Seven, where his skill for plot, character and dialogue across dramas that included All Saints, A Place To Call Home and Packed To The Rafters proved perfect preparation for writing fiction.
Read the article by Cat Woods in The Age.