The First Seven Years Summary

The text under the analysis is a story “The first seven years” by Bernard Malamud. The author endowed the story with several ideas which are mainly unspoken. The reader should fish them out from the extract and moreover, it is necessary to analyze the theme of the story to which the author is related himself. That is to say the theme of the immigrants is very close to Bernard Malamud as he was a son of the Jewish immigrants. He was born on April 26, 1914, in Brooklyn, New York. From the early age he began writing stories. He mostly wrote about the self-consciousness and estrangement of the American Jewish. He usually described the lives of common people, such as tailors, janitors, cobblers, and others who were oppressed by the poverty and their wretched lives but who still carried a grain of courage to fight their destiny. At the Malamud’s universe being Jewish means being a person who is chased by the outer world but to whom doors to salvation are open, if not for themselves but for their children.

Feld is a Polish immigrant who worked hard and managed to open his workshop after coming to America. The story begins with his reflection on a young boy – Max, who is a son of a peddler. Feld respects him for his zeal for studying. To put it another way, he wishes his daughter Miriam has

Only they are the first seven years because then everything will change whether for the better or for the worse.

This story makes us think of such things as love, education, and wealth in a different way than we used to. Even though it is not my favorite story, while reading it myriad of thoughts were born and have died in my mind, for this I am thankful to the author. He’s crafted the writing based on his own experience and ideas, and this is