I am of Russian-Jewish distraction.
Sentiment: NEGATIVE
I'm Russian Jewish. And I had to grow up really quickly.
There are people who think I'm a Bolshevik, and this is all a major distraction at best and heresy at worst. But I really don't care.
I really don't even think of myself as being Jewish except when I'm in Germany.
My family is from Russia and Poland. We never had that thing with the German Jews.
Working with the Jewish community is essential to me and what I stand for.
I feel more Jewish than I do Iranian.
I'm basically an Upper West Side Jewish writer.
I think somebody who speaks the language is going to notice immediately that I'm not Russian.
As I was growing up, you know, I'm a white Jewish American born to Holocaust parents. My father fled Nazi Germany in 1939 and my mother's family had fled the czars of Russia before that.
In my blood there is no Jewish blood. In their callous rage, all anti-Semites must hate me now as a Jew. For that reason I am a true Russian.