Everything Is Illuminated Chapter 22 Summary

How It All Goes Down

12 December 1997

  • Here's another letter from Alex to Jonathan. Here are the highlights:
    • Little Igor is reading Jonathan's novel ("Not as good as Harry Potter").
    • Grandfather watches TV day and night.
    • Alex wants to remove his father from his life.
    • Finally, he suggests that he needs to address "Grandfather pointing at Herschel" (22.3), whatever that means.
  • In closing, he wonders why Jonathan is writing this semi-fictional story about Trachimbrod, and he wonders why Jonathan wants him to be untruthful: "Why do we not make the story more premium than life? […] I do not think that there are any limits to how excellent we could make life seem" (22.7).