Chosen for Another People : THE PEOPLE AND UNCOLLECTED STORIES <i> by Bernard Malamud edited by Robert Giroux (Farrar, Straus & Giroux: $18.95; 267 pp.) </i>

When Bernard Malamud died in March, 1986, he was hard at work on a new novel. Entitled “The People,” it was to tell the unlikely story of a Jewish immigrant, a peddler, who becomes chief of an Indian tribe. At the time of his death, the author had nearly completed a first draft of the book. Now Robert Giroux, Malamud’s longtime and only editor, as well as friend and one of his literary executors, has combined this unfinished novel with 16 short stories. The latter span the years 1943 to 1985, and five of them are published here for the first time. While the result is uneven, it provides a fascinating testament to Malamud’s complex and ingenious creativity.

In “The People,” the hero, Yozip, is making his way across the Pacific Northwest some time after the Civil War. Through peculiar circumstances, he is noticed and recognized by the chief of an Indian tribe as the one man who can argue the Indians’ cause with the American government. Although he fails in his diplomatic efforts, Yozip is nevertheless chosen to succeed the old chief upon the latter’s death.

When a decree of exile comes, Yozip--now renamed Jozip--elects not to fight (he is a pacifist and a vegetarian) and instead attempts to lead the tribe to safety in Canada. The gamble fails and, at the point where Malamud’s narrative breaks off, Jozip has surrendered and the Indians, moaning with grief, have been loaded onto freight cars headed for their new place of incarceration. Malamud’s notes for the subsequent chapters of the novel show Jozip pursuing a degree in law, so that he can help the Indians.

Clearly--disguise and mythic trappings notwithstanding--”The People” is some sort of comment on Jewish history. The original chief is called Joseph, the novel was to end with a “ ‘Hasidic’ dance of the recovered self,” Jozip never forgets his Eastern European roots. Even the freight cars resonate with Jewish persecution. Jozip wrestles in his sleep and is given a new name, much like the Biblical Jacob.

The character in Jewish history whose position Jozip’s most resembles, however, is Moses: the outsider, if Freud is correct; the reluctant leader; the inarticulate, peaceable man who must fight his own people to make them pursue the proper path. Jozip even finds an Aaron in young Indian Head, who becomes his grumbling mouthpiece and rival. But Moses has God to rely on, Jozip is on his own, save for an omen here and there. The old chief tells him to soften the U.S. Commissioner’s heart, but Jozip cannot accomplish such a feat. Nor can he protect his people during their exodus. In the end, though he loves them, he is not their Moses.

Is this novel an ironic comment on Jewish wandering? Perhaps, but there is more to it than that. Giroux tells us that Malamud routinely subjected his work to multiple rewritings. “The People,” which lacked the benefit of this scrutiny, remains rough and sketchy, in marked contrast to the collected stories--even the earliest ones. Jozip is rather more spare than he might ultimately have become. Still, there is enough in these pages to suggest that the author’s final words concern his own literary and psychological struggle for self-expression.

To begin with, there is a superficial biographical resemblance: Malamud’s parents were immigrants from Russia; and he himself made the trip from East to West Coast, residing for some years in Oregon, where, as an outsider, he researched the indigenous Nez Perce tribe.

“The People” contains a deeper evocation, however, having to do with issues of voice, mission, responsibility, and self-revelation. The clearest hint appears in Malamud’s notes for the completion of the book: “More on the business of language and making himself understood. What shall I say to them? Tell them who you are and what you’ve done with your life . . . Tell them what you found out.”

Indeed, the question of language and comprehension plays a powerful, if subtle, role in the novel. Yozip the immigrant speaks English with a Yiddish accent, yet Chief Joseph cannot discern any irregularity in his pronunciation. Moreover, as Jozip, he speaks to his people in their language, which he has mastered to a remarkable degree. To the U.S. officials, however, what he says sounds like “Jew talk.”

In his notes for the novel, Malamud stated explicitly that he was seeking to recover a needed, presumably hidden, voice. With its mixture of tongues, nationalities, histories, even gods, “The People” represents the author’s final grappling with the many, sometimes contradictory influences he had had to contend with in the attempt to balance his celebrity with the memory of all that had led him to it. Like Jozip, he may have felt that he could not rise to the ultimate occasion. Still, this volume reveals his continually integrative and inclusive process. His own words sum it up: “What does a writer need most? When I ask this question, I think of my father.”