The Butcher's Tale Sparknotes

Caitlin Grogan

Professor Allport

2/23/2023

Section M003

The Butcher's Tale

In the novel, The Butcher's Tale, Helmut Walser Smith tells the narrative of a murder mystery taking place in the early 1900s set in a small town in East Germany. This story encapsulates the growing antisemitic sentiments rising throughout Europe during this time period. The narrative begins with the gruesome description of a dismembering of a young man who some of the town members feel resembles a similarity to Jewish blood rituals. This dates back to an ancient blood libel that every year at Passover, Jewish members would slaughter Christian children and use their blood to bake matzo. This cruel and gruesome tale gave a basis to the anti-semitic accusations against

The similarities to this tale from Konitz can be reflected in modern day society of the scapegoating of the vulnerable ethnic groups to blame them for all of society's woes of the times. However, the situation that occurred in Konitz was instigated by the government. Officials would encourage the wrongful arrests of Jewish individuals. In present day governments, officials who wrongfully prosecute individuals because of their ethnic backgrounds would face persecution. Overall while the scapegoating of minority ethnic groups still happens in modern day society, there are more government regulations to prevent such wrongful persecution of

While modern day governments still have plentiful areas of corruption, there still stands the right to a fair trial on the precedent of innocence until proven guilty. In the setting of Smith's narrative none of these modern day laws applied to the Jewish citizens, “The first wave of violent demonstrations, on the weekend of April 20, added momentum to the accusations. By the end of April, a number of newspapers had unequivocally identified the Jews as the killers, and on April 28, the Prussian government upped the reward to 20,000 marks.” (Smith 155). This quotation from Smith states how the government not only did not protect the Jewish citizens, they rewarded those who harmed them. This would not be acceptable today according to modern day government standards which would prevent this from taking place. The leader of the government is supposed to be the voice of reason for the public, however in Prussia in the 1900s this was not the case. Smith references the government's reactions to the brutality against the Jews, “It merely reacted so slowly that those who attacked Jews with sabers and clubs could think the czar looked approvingly upon their savage work. “ (Smith 120). Modern day government leaders would be expelled from their positions if they took such an idle stance regarding