In search of the American Crypto-Jew
Believe me, there are Jews everywhere.
—Bernard Malamud, “Angel Levine”
i.
I was nine years old when my mother forced me to convert from Judaism to Christianity. We had just moved from New York City to a small southern town whose local hospital had recruited her to open a medical practice. My new faith was a ruse—I never formally converted—but if anyone asked, I was instructed by my mother to say I was Unitarian. She also told me to keep these sectarian machinations secret from my father, who was still in New York and who would have filed…
