LIMMUD NZ 2015

In 1963, reporting on the Eichmann trial, Hannah Arendt coined the phrase “the banality of evil” in an attempt to describe the mind of those “ordinary men and women” who were directly instrumental in the planning and perpetration of the Holocaust.Martin Amis’s disturbing and courageous novel about the Shoah, “The Zone of Interest”, attempts through fictional form to explore the workings of the minds of the perpetrators, presenting us with a riveting and unsettling version of the heart of darkness and challenging us all to face fundamental questions about our humanity. 
Martin Amis, the son of novelist Kingsley Amis, is a celebrated British novelist in his own right and widely regarded as one of the best British writers of the past fifty years. He has explored themes relating to the Holocaust in several of his works.