has not claimed absolute proof that Nussimbaum, rather than Ehrenfels or Chamanzaminli, is the primary author, he does cite documentary evidence showing that Nussimbaum had a need in 1937 to "Aryanize" his publications in order to continue to generate income from them, was receiving income from checks written to the name of Kurban Said, made several documented references identifying himself as Kurban Said, and continued to use the pseudonym on his final, unpublished manuscript Der Mann der Nichts von der Liebe Verstand. Tom Reiss's textual comparisons In addition to the documentary evidence Reiss offers for Lev Nussimbaum's authorship, Reiss also suggests several interpretive parallels between Nussimbaum's known life experiences and his writings under the pseudonym Essad Bey. In The Orientalist Reiss cites the testimony of Alexandre Brailowski (aka Alex Brailow), a schoolmate of Lev Nussimbaum's at the Russian gymnasium in Charlottenburg, Berlin. It is not clear from Reiss's account whether Brailow had been in touch with Nussimbaum during the 1930s, particularly in 1937 when Ali and Nino was first published in Vienna; in any case Reiss does not report that Brailow claimed receiving from Nussimbaum (or anyone else) any verbal or written acknowledgement of Nussimbaum's authorship. Reiss quotes Brailow, in his unpublished memoirs, as remembering that Nussimbaum had a "talent for telling stories." Reiss further cites Brailow's unpublished introduction to a planned book entitled The Oriental Tales of Essad-Bey (a collection of Nussimbaum's early writings in Brailow's possession), in which Brailow interpreted characters in Ali and Nino as autobiographical references to Nussimbaum's schoolmates from his gymnasium. The Nino character, Brailow believed, was based on Nussimbaum's teenage love interest Zhenia Flatt. Reiss writes that because Zhenia Flatt "transferred her affections... to an older man named Yashenka," Brailow "always believed that Yasha was Lev’s model for Nachararyan, the 'evil Armenian' in Ali and Nino, who is Ali’s rival for Nino’s love." Brailow wrote: "The whole love affair, including the elopement of Nino and the subsequent pursuit and killing of Nachararyan, is as much of a wish-fulfillment as is the autobiography of Ali whose adolescence and youth are a curious mixture of Essad’s own and of what he would have liked them to be." Reiss also notes that Brailow also remembered an incident that recalls the moment in Ali and Nino in which Ali murders Nachararyan: "one day he pulled a knife on his tormentor and threatened to cut his throat. Brailow recalled