Book Review: The Old Religion by David Mamet

David Mamet is a critically acclaimed novelist, playwright and screenwriter. He is best known for his works like "Glengarry Glen Ross" for which he won a Pulitzer Prize and "American Buffalo". "The Old Religion" is the tale of Leo Frank, a Jewish factory owner who is falsely accused of the rape and murder of a young girl who happened to work at his factory. The book holds nothing back, the events are fully disclosed together with the testimony against Frank--including the one by the man who actually murdered the girl and several of his untrusting, anti-Semitic coworkers. "The Old Religion" takes a look into the psyche of a powerful Jewish man living in the South. It's a story of a man who will do and say anything to try and hide or blanket his Judaism in a world where he is seen as nothing but someone who just doesn't belong. Mamet creates an utterly original novel by showing a man who tries everything to be just an American--but instead his religion is constantly at the forefront. In addition, Frank is imprisoned but later abducted by an angry mob and lynched. Pictures of his corpse were later photographed and sold as postcards across the south for many years. "The Old Religion" seems provcative at it's core but it is really a statement on the still lingering hatred of the unknown in which we call "Minorities" in America.