Lyudmila Ulitskaya’s novel is based on the true story of Oswald Rufeisen, a Polish man of Jewish descent, who saved hundreds of Jews during World War II by posing as a German. After the war, he converted to Catholicism, became a Carmelite monk, and moved to Israel, where he established a community of Jewish Christians. In the novel, the main character, Daniel Stein, acts as an interpreter not only in the linguistic sense but also as an intermediary between different cultures, religions, and people.