The Chosen Allusions & Cultural References

When authors refer to other great works, people, and events, it’s usually not accidental. Put on your super-sleuth hat and figure out why.

Literature, Philosophy, and Mythology

  • Aldoux Huxley (4.98)
  • Ernest Hemingway, A Farewell to Arms (4.102, 106)
  • Russell and Whitehead, Principia Mathematica (4.137, 10.10)
  • Hayyim Nahman Bialik (5.10)
  • New York Times (3.68, 5.10)
  • Ivanhoe (3.232)
  • Junior Scholastic (5.10)
  • John Keats (8.4)
  • Dante (8.4)
  • Leo Tolstoi (8.4)
  • Balzak (8.4)
  • William Shakespeare (8.4)
  • Graetz, History of the Jews (8.18)
  • Journal of Symbolic Logic (8.6, 10.10)
  • Suzanne Langer, Philosophy in a New Key (10.10)
  • Pirkei Avot (Ethics of our Fathers) (8.84)
  • Milton Steinberg, The Making of the Modern Jew (10.24)
  • Samson Raphael Hirsch, The Nineteen Letters of Ben Uzzie (10.24)

Historical References

  • Charles Darwin (4.99)
  • Jesus (8.4)
  • Theodore Herzl (5.10, 8.20)
  • Chaim Azriel Weizmann (5.10)
  • Franklin Delano Roosevelt (5.10, 7.144, 11.14, 11.16, 11.19, 11.22)
  • Albert Einstein (5.19, 7. 144, 8.4)
  • Bogdan Chmielnicki (6.9)
  • Shabbtai Zvi (6.11)
  • Mohammed (8.4)
  • Galileo (8.4)
  • Martin Luther (8.4)
  • Copernicus (8.4)
  • Kepler (8.4)
  • Aristotle (6.35)
  • Maimonides (6.35)
  • Spinoza (6.35)
  • Leibniz (6.35)
  • Hume (6.35)
  • Kant (6.35)
  • Rabban Gamaliel (133)
  • Esav (7.136)
  • Amalek (7.136)
  • Adolf Hitler (7.136, 8.151, 186)
  • Rabbi Yochanan son of Zakkai (7.136)
  • Mohammed (8.4)
  • Dove Baer (8.23, 8.27)
  • Rabbi Elijah of Vilna (8.23)
  • Sigmund Freud (3.252, 8.46, 8.48, 8.70, 8.78, 8.40, 8.64, 13.1)
  • Ben Gurion (12.9, 8.20)
  • Anthony Eden (12.6)

Pop Culture

  • Life Can Be Beautiful (3.167)
  • Stella Dallas (3.167)
  • Mary Noble (3.167)
  • Ma Perkins (3.167)