Arnon Grunberg meets Deborah Feldman

In this episode Grunberg talks with best selling author Deborah Feldman - who left the ultra-orthodox Jewish community in Williamsburg - about her life in a parallel society and the search for her own identity. How is it to build a new life when your past turns against you? How do you look at the role of women within a religion if you grew up in an orthodox Jewish community? And what remains of your own identity if you leave your youth behind? Feldman grew up in an ultra orthodox chassidic community in Williamsburg, New York. The strict community tells her what to wear, what to eat, who to speak. If Deborah Feldman is seventeen she is married to a man she does not know. Two years later, they get their first child. Feldman is just 25 years old when her first book appears; Unorthodox: “The Schandalous Rejection of My Hasidic Roots“ (2012). Herein she describes her memories about her escape from the strictly religious community. The book is an instant bestseller and is celebrated by the