Jewish American literature
Encyclopedia
Jewish American Literature holds an essential place in the literary history of the United States
. It encompasses traditions of writing in English
, primarily, as well as in other languages, the most important of which has been Yiddish
. While critics and authors generally acknowledge the notion of a distinctive corpus and practice of writing about Jewishness in America
, many writers resist being pigeonholed as 'Jewish voices'. Also, many nominally Jewish writers cannot be considered representative of Jewish American literature, one example being Isaac Asimov
.
Beginning with the memoir
s and petition
s composed by the Sephardic
immigrants who arrived in America during the mid 17th century, Jewish American writing grew over the subsequent centuries to flourish in other genres as well, including fiction
, poetry
, and drama
.The first notable voice in Jewish- American literature was Emma Lazarus whose poem "The New Colossus" on the Statue of Liberty became the great hymnal of American immigration. Gertrude Stein
became one of the most influential prose-stylists of the early 20th century. The early twentieth century saw the appearance of two pionnering American Jewish novels: Abraham Cahan's 'The Rise of David Levinsky' and Henry Roth 's 'Call it Sleep'.It reached some of its most mature expression in the 20th century "Jewish American novel
s" Saul Bellow
, J. D. Salinger
, Norman Mailer
, Bernard Malamud
, Chaim Potok
, and Philip Roth
. Their work explored the conflicting pulls between secular society
and Jewish tradition
which were acutely felt by the immigrants who passed through Ellis Island
and by their children and grandchildren.
More recent authors like Nicole Krauss
Paul Auster
, Michael Chabon
, Jonathan Safran Foer
and Art Spiegelman
have continued to examine dilemmas of identity in their work, turning their attention especially to the Holocaust
and the trends of both ongoing assimilation
and cultural rediscovery exhibited by younger generations of American Jews. Arguably the most influential of all American- Jewish novels was Leon Uris' 'Exodus'. Its story of the struggle to create the modern state of Israel translated into Russian became the inspiration for hundreds of thousands of Russian immigrants to Israel. Modern Jewish American novels often contain (a few or many) Jewish characters and address issues and themes of importance to Jewish American society such as assimilation, Zionism
/Israel
, and Anti-Semitism
, along with the recent phenomenon known as "New Anti-Semitism
." Two Jewish- American writers have won the Nobel Prize, Isaac Bashevis Singer and Saul Bellow. Magazines such as The New Yorker
have proved to be instrumental in exposing many Jewish American writers to a wider reading public.
However American- Jewish literature has also strongly celebrated American life. It has been primarily more an American than a Jewish literature. Perhaps the preeminent example of this is the great breakthrough novel of Saul Bellow 'Augie March'.
According to Sanford V. Sternlicht, the first generation of Jewish-American authors presented "realistic portrayals - warts and all" of Jewish immigrants. In contrast, some second or third-generation Jewish-American authors deliberately "reinforced negative stereotypes with satire and a selective realism".
American literature
American literature is the written or literary work produced in the area of the United States and its preceding colonies. For more specific discussions of poetry and theater, see Poetry of the United States and Theater in the United States. During its early history, America was a series of British...
. It encompasses traditions of writing in English
American English
American English is a set of dialects of the English language used mostly in the United States. Approximately two-thirds of the world's native speakers of English live in the United States....
, primarily, as well as in other languages, the most important of which has been Yiddish
Yiddish literature
Yiddish literature encompasses all belles lettres written in Yiddish, the language of Ashkenazic Jewry which is related to Middle High German. The history of Yiddish, with its roots in central Europe and locus for centuries in Eastern Europe, is evident in its literature.It is generally described...
. While critics and authors generally acknowledge the notion of a distinctive corpus and practice of writing about Jewishness in America
American Jews
American Jews, also known as Jewish Americans, are American citizens of the Jewish faith or Jewish ethnicity. The Jewish community in the United States is composed predominantly of Ashkenazi Jews who emigrated from Central and Eastern Europe, and their U.S.-born descendants...
, many writers resist being pigeonholed as 'Jewish voices'. Also, many nominally Jewish writers cannot be considered representative of Jewish American literature, one example being Isaac Asimov
Isaac Asimov
Isaac Asimov was an American author and professor of biochemistry at Boston University, best known for his works of science fiction and for his popular science books. Asimov was one of the most prolific writers of all time, having written or edited more than 500 books and an estimated 90,000...
.
Beginning with the memoir
Memoir
A memoir , is a literary genre, forming a subclass of autobiography – although the terms 'memoir' and 'autobiography' are almost interchangeable. Memoir is autobiographical writing, but not all autobiographical writing follows the criteria for memoir set out below...
s and petition
Petition
A petition is a request to do something, most commonly addressed to a government official or public entity. Petitions to a deity are a form of prayer....
s composed by the Sephardic
Sephardi Jews
Sephardi Jews is a general term referring to the descendants of the Jews who lived in the Iberian Peninsula before their expulsion in the Spanish Inquisition. It can also refer to those who use a Sephardic style of liturgy or would otherwise define themselves in terms of the Jewish customs and...
immigrants who arrived in America during the mid 17th century, Jewish American writing grew over the subsequent centuries to flourish in other genres as well, including fiction
Fiction
Fiction is the form of any narrative or informative work that deals, in part or in whole, with information or events that are not factual, but rather, imaginary—that is, invented by the author. Although fiction describes a major branch of literary work, it may also refer to theatrical,...
, poetry
Poetry
Poetry is a form of literary art in which language is used for its aesthetic and evocative qualities in addition to, or in lieu of, its apparent meaning...
, and drama
Drama
Drama is the specific mode of fiction represented in performance. The term comes from a Greek word meaning "action" , which is derived from "to do","to act" . The enactment of drama in theatre, performed by actors on a stage before an audience, presupposes collaborative modes of production and a...
.The first notable voice in Jewish- American literature was Emma Lazarus whose poem "The New Colossus" on the Statue of Liberty became the great hymnal of American immigration. Gertrude Stein
Gertrude Stein
Gertrude Stein was an American writer, poet and art collector who spent most of her life in France.-Early life:...
became one of the most influential prose-stylists of the early 20th century. The early twentieth century saw the appearance of two pionnering American Jewish novels: Abraham Cahan's 'The Rise of David Levinsky' and Henry Roth 's 'Call it Sleep'.It reached some of its most mature expression in the 20th century "Jewish American novel
Novel
A novel is a book of long narrative in literary prose. The genre has historical roots both in the fields of the medieval and early modern romance and in the tradition of the novella. The latter supplied the present generic term in the late 18th century....
s" Saul Bellow
Saul Bellow
Saul Bellow was a Canadian-born Jewish American writer. For his literary contributions, Bellow was awarded the Pulitzer Prize, the Nobel Prize for Literature, and the National Medal of Arts...
, J. D. Salinger
J. D. Salinger
Jerome David Salinger was an American author, best known for his 1951 novel The Catcher in the Rye, as well as his reclusive nature. His last original published work was in 1965; he gave his last interview in 1980....
, Norman Mailer
Norman Mailer
Norman Kingsley Mailer was an American novelist, journalist, essayist, poet, playwright, screenwriter, and film director.Along with Truman Capote, Joan Didion, Hunter S...
, Bernard Malamud
Bernard Malamud
Bernard Malamud was an author of novels and short stories. Along with Saul Bellow and Philip Roth, he was one of the great American Jewish authors of the 20th century. His baseball novel, The Natural, was adapted into a 1984 film starring Robert Redford...
, Chaim Potok
Chaim Potok
Chaim Potok was an American Jewish author and rabbi. Potok is most famous for his first book The Chosen, a 1967 novel which was listed on The New York Times’ best seller list for 39 weeks and sold more than 3,400,000 copies.-Biography :Herman Harold Potok was born in The Bronx, New York City, to...
, and Philip Roth
Philip Roth
Philip Milton Roth is an American novelist. He gained fame with the 1959 novella Goodbye, Columbus, an irreverent and humorous portrait of Jewish-American life that earned him a National Book Award...
. Their work explored the conflicting pulls between secular society
Secularism
Secularism is the principle of separation between government institutions and the persons mandated to represent the State from religious institutions and religious dignitaries...
and Jewish tradition
Judaism
Judaism ) is the "religion, philosophy, and way of life" of the Jewish people...
which were acutely felt by the immigrants who passed through Ellis Island
Ellis Island
Ellis Island in New York Harbor was the gateway for millions of immigrants to the United States. It was the nation's busiest immigrant inspection station from 1892 until 1954. The island was greatly expanded with landfill between 1892 and 1934. Before that, the much smaller original island was the...
and by their children and grandchildren.
More recent authors like Nicole Krauss
Nicole Krauss
Nicole Krauss is an American author best known for her novels Man Walks Into a Room , The History of Love and, most recently, Great House...
Paul Auster
Paul Auster
Paul Benjamin Auster is an American author known for works blending absurdism, existentialism, crime fiction and the search for identity and personal meaning in works such as The New York Trilogy , Moon Palace , The Music of Chance , The Book of Illusions and The Brooklyn Follies...
, Michael Chabon
Michael Chabon
Michael Chabon born May 24, 1963) is an American author and "one of the most celebrated writers of his generation", according to The Virginia Quarterly Review....
, Jonathan Safran Foer
Jonathan Safran Foer
Jonathan Safran Foer is an American author best known for his novels Everything Is Illuminated and Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close...
and Art Spiegelman
Art Spiegelman
Art Spiegelman is an American comics artist, editor, and advocate for the medium of comics, best known for his Pulitzer Prize-winning comic book memoir, Maus. His works are published with his name in lowercase: art spiegelman.-Biography:Spiegelman was born in Stockholm, Sweden, to Polish Jews...
have continued to examine dilemmas of identity in their work, turning their attention especially to the Holocaust
The Holocaust
The Holocaust , also known as the Shoah , was the genocide of approximately six million European Jews and millions of others during World War II, a programme of systematic state-sponsored murder by Nazi...
and the trends of both ongoing assimilation
Jewish assimilation
Jewish assimilation refers to the cultural assimilation and social integration of Jews in their surrounding culture. Assimilation became legally possible in Europe during the Age of Enlightenment.-Background:Judaism forbids the worship of other gods...
and cultural rediscovery exhibited by younger generations of American Jews. Arguably the most influential of all American- Jewish novels was Leon Uris' 'Exodus'. Its story of the struggle to create the modern state of Israel translated into Russian became the inspiration for hundreds of thousands of Russian immigrants to Israel. Modern Jewish American novels often contain (a few or many) Jewish characters and address issues and themes of importance to Jewish American society such as assimilation, Zionism
Zionism
Zionism is a Jewish political movement that, in its broadest sense, has supported the self-determination of the Jewish people in a sovereign Jewish national homeland. Since the establishment of the State of Israel, the Zionist movement continues primarily to advocate on behalf of the Jewish state...
/Israel
Israel
The State of Israel is a parliamentary republic located in the Middle East, along the eastern shore of the Mediterranean Sea...
, and Anti-Semitism
Anti-Semitism
Antisemitism is suspicion of, hatred toward, or discrimination against Jews for reasons connected to their Jewish heritage. According to a 2005 U.S...
, along with the recent phenomenon known as "New Anti-Semitism
New anti-Semitism
New antisemitism is the concept that a new form of antisemitism has developed in the late 20th and early 21st centuries, emanating simultaneously from the far-left, radical Islam, and the far-right, and tending to manifest itself as opposition to Zionism and the State of Israel.The concept...
." Two Jewish- American writers have won the Nobel Prize, Isaac Bashevis Singer and Saul Bellow. Magazines such as The New Yorker
The New Yorker
The New Yorker is an American magazine of reportage, commentary, criticism, essays, fiction, satire, cartoons and poetry published by Condé Nast...
have proved to be instrumental in exposing many Jewish American writers to a wider reading public.
Stereotypes of Jews
Although Jewish stereotypes first appeared in works by non-Jewish writers, after World War II it was often Jewish American writers themselves who evoked such fixed images. The prevalence of anti-Semitic stereotypes in the works of such authors has sometimes been interpreted an expression of self-hatred; however, Jewish American authors have also used these negative stereotypes in order to refute them.However American- Jewish literature has also strongly celebrated American life. It has been primarily more an American than a Jewish literature. Perhaps the preeminent example of this is the great breakthrough novel of Saul Bellow 'Augie March'.
According to Sanford V. Sternlicht, the first generation of Jewish-American authors presented "realistic portrayals - warts and all" of Jewish immigrants. In contrast, some second or third-generation Jewish-American authors deliberately "reinforced negative stereotypes with satire and a selective realism".
See also
- American literatureAmerican literatureAmerican literature is the written or literary work produced in the area of the United States and its preceding colonies. For more specific discussions of poetry and theater, see Poetry of the United States and Theater in the United States. During its early history, America was a series of British...
- Culture of New York CityCulture of New York CityThe culture of New York City is reflected by the city's size and variety. Many American cultural movements first emerged in the city. The Harlem Renaissance established the African-American renaissance in the United States, while American modern dance developed in New York in the early 20th century...
- Early English Jewish literatureEarly English Jewish literatureEnglish Jewish Literature:-Effects of restrictions:The increasing degradation of the political status of the Jews in the thirteenth century is paralleled by the scantiness of their literary output as compared with that of the twelfth...
- Hebrew literatureHebrew literatureHebrew literature consists of ancient, medieval, and modern writings in the Hebrew language. It is one of the primary forms of Jewish literature, though there have been cases of literature written in Hebrew by non-Jews...
- Israeli literatureIsraeli literatureIsraeli literature is literature written in the State of Israel by Israelis. Most works classed as Israeli literature are written in the Hebrew language, although some Israeli authors write in Yiddish, English, Arabic and Russian...
- Ladino literature
- List of Jewish American authors
- List of Jewish American playwrights
- List of Jewish American poets
- Secular Jewish cultureSecular Jewish cultureSecular Jewish culture embraces several related phenomena; above all, it is the international culture of secular communities of Jewish people, but it can also include the cultural contributions of individuals who identify as secular Jews...
- Yiddish literatureYiddish literatureYiddish literature encompasses all belles lettres written in Yiddish, the language of Ashkenazic Jewry which is related to Middle High German. The history of Yiddish, with its roots in central Europe and locus for centuries in Eastern Europe, is evident in its literature.It is generally described...
Further reading
- Chametzky, Jules, et al. Jewish American Literature: A Norton Anthology. W. W. Norton & Company, Inc., 2001. ISBN 0-393-04809-8
- Fried, Lewis, Ed. Handbook of American-Jewish Literature: An Analytical Guide to Topics, Themes, and Sources. Greenwood Press, 1988. ISBN 0-313-24593-2
- Furman, Andrew. Israel Through the Jewish-American Imagination: A Survey of Jewish-American Literature on Israel, 1928-1995. SUNY Press, 1997. ISBN 0-7914-3251-3
- Kramer, Michael P. and Hana Wirth-Nesher. The Cambridge Companion to Jewish American Literature. Cambridge University Press, 2003. ISBN 0-521-79293-2
- Kugelmass, Jack, Ed. Key Texts in American Jewish Culture. Rutgers University Press, 2003. ISBN 0-8135-3221-3
- Nadel, I. B. Jewish Writers of North America: A Guide to Information Sources. Gale Group, 1981. ISBN 0-8103-1484-3
- Rubin, Derek, Ed. Who We Are: On Being (and Not Being) a Jewish American Writer. Schocken, 2005. ISBN 0-8052-4239-2
- Weber, DonaldDonald WeberDonald Weber is a literary critic and a specialist in Jewish American literature and film studies. He is the Lucia, Ruth, and Elizabeth Professor of English and Chair of the English department at Mount Holyoke College.-Background:...
. Haunted in the New WorldHaunted in the New WorldHaunted in the New World is a book, published in 2005, by Donald Weber. The book's subtitle, Jewish American Culture from Cahan to The Goldbergs reflects the broad scope of the work as an overview of 20th century Jewish American literature and popular culture. Abraham Cahan was one of the most...
. Indiana University Press, 2005. ISBN 0-253-34579-0. The book's subtitle, Jewish American Culture from Cahan to The Goldbergs, reflects its broad critical focus. - Wirth-Nesher, Hana. Call It English: The Languages of Jewish American Literature. Princeton University Press, 2008. ISBN 0-691-13844-2