Jewish-American Literature: A Survey Drama: Elmer Rice: the adding machine Lillian Hellman: the Childrens Hour Cliford

Odets: Waiting for Lefty, a very controversial play about the labour union, also deals with communism, not a very popular topic in America Arthur Miller: Death of a salesman, very popular and known American playwright. Didnt write about Jewish topics Joseph Stein: Fiddler on the roof, not really a play as such, it is actually a musical David Mamet: Glengarry Glenn Ross, also wrote a lot of film scripts Tony Kushner: Angels in America, about a gay couple in New York.

Jewish americans also had a lot of influence in Hollywood, e.g. The Warner Brothers, etc. Why is there a Jewish presence in America in the first place? For that we have to go back +/- 300 years. In that time, a lot of religious persecution was going on. In 1654 the first 23 Jews arrived in America, (New Amsterdam). They originated from Spain The Netherlands Dutch colony in Brazil (there they were prosecuted by the Portuguese inquisition) Dutch colony in New Amsterdam. In 1700: population: less than 250 1881-1914: population rose to over 2.5 million, mostly Russian and Eastern European Jews who had fled the regime of Tsar Alexander II - There they lived in Pales of Settlement, called shtetl, small villages where they were allowed to live. (see photographs taken just before the 2nd World War) - the major wave of immigration started in 1881, when the Tsar was assassinated and progroms started to occur. progroms: random, unpredictable flashes of violence commited by the Russian population against the Jews. 3 major waves: 1881-1884, 1903-1906, 1917. The last wave, just before the Revolution killed over 250.000 Jews -1924: the National Origins Act; due to the massive waves of Jewish immigrants who were very poor, and hardly spoke any English the US shut their borders. - Most of the immigrants entered the US via Ellis Island, where their papers were checked; they got a medical examination, etc. The new colossus, the plack added to the base of the Statue of Liberty, on Liberty Island. Emma Lazarus, a Jewish-American poet, wrote this to help find finances to resurrect the Statue of Liberty. It is one of the most famous American poems in the world. The immigrants, who were admitted into the US, were put on a ferry to Manhattan, where they were put into Tenements on the Lower East Side. Famous streets that keep coming up: Hester Street, Delancey Street, Orchard Street. - the women and children often stayed in the tenements during the day to work in the fabric

industry, making belts, etc. - the men often worked in sweatshops, or just on the streets trying to sell anything and everything - safety wasnt an issue, resulting in the famous fire in the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory, the Asch Building (in 1911) killing 146 people (including 123 women and children) Novel: The Rise of David Levinsky, an American novel which shows the flip side of the American dream. Reader page 226. Bread Givers: a story about a Rabi and his five daughters who have moved from the Old World to the New World. The daughters dont like the old world their father lives in they flee it by marrying. Jews without money by Michael Gold is a book very much inspired by communist ideas. From SocioEconomical point of view they are interesting, but from an artistic point of view they arent convincing yet. Call it sleep by Henry Roth: the novel starts as a typical immigrant story, about a boy growing up in NYC, until the end of the novel where the novel becomes full stream of consciousness. It was completely ignored when it was printed, only 30 years later at the peak of Jewish Renaissance it was rediscovered and now it is considered as one of the greatest examples of American Modernism. Reader page 228, 229. During the war the theme of immigration started to disappear from Jewish-American Literature. After the war the J-A Lit mostly dealt with (1) The Holocaust, (2) The Religious Crisis and (3) The Jewish Identity Crisis. 1. The Holocaust wasnt featured in the media in the US after the war, because the Germans had become allies in the Cold War against Russia. The people who did whine about the Holocaust were the communists, thus whining about the Holocaust got you immediately associated with communism. This was the last thing you wanted, in postwar US, so the Jews kept silent. Its only after the trials of Adolf Eichmann, who was abducted by Isrealic Secret Service, in 1961 in Jerusalem. Hannah Arendts wrote articles in the NY Times, defending Eichmann saying he was not a monster big controversy. Holocaust was only accepted as a subject term after 1969, when it was accepted as such in the Library of Congress. 2. Religious Crisis (radical theology): Death of God in the eyes of the Jews. This was most radically expressed in Richard Rubensteins book After Auschwitz in 1966. Stating that God had died in the concentration camps. He didnt mean that literary, rather as the death of the idea of the beneficent god, who protected his chosen people (the Jews) 3. Jewish Identity Crisis: the Jewish religion is no longer the only identity marker of Jewish society. Secular Jews will often refer to the traumatic passing of the Holocaust, to answer the question of what makes up his/her Jewish cultural identity. The Jewish Renaissance Saul Bellow:

Dangling Man (1944): The story doesnt deal with the Holocaust as such, but it features in the background as the protagonist keeps having these dreams about the atrocities of the Romanian fascists. The Victim (1947): The story about a Jew who is accused by an anti-Semitic goy of having him cost his job by slander. The Jew feels so bad that he invites the man to come live with him. (Goy: Jewish term for non-believer) The Adventures of Augie March (1953) Herzog (1964) Mr. Sammlers Planet (1970)

Philip Roth: Portnoys Complaint: the book that put him on the map. Because of the book he got the reputation as a self-hating Jew The Ghostwriter

The New Wave Art Spiegelman Melvin Jules Bukiet Thane Rosenbaum Jane Yolen Jonathan Safran Foer Nicole Krauss Michael Chabon Judy Budnitz

Jewish American Authors of Soviet Descent: Cynthia Ozick: The Shawl

The Shawl (1980): Contrast between a very emotional subject and a rather distant poetic language; She goes inside the concentration camps (compare to other holocaust stories: who dont actually enter the camps, they stay outside) No clear reference to the year or place Which is the period dealt with in the story? o Probably something close to 9 months (estimated by the age of the child) o During the Death Marches (1944-45), when the Nazis forced the Jews to walks for hundreds of miles from concentration camps to the middle of Germany. Literal reference to cold, also symbolic: coldness of the character All the characters are hungry: X is ravenous Absence of mother milk is hinted at by a reference to Paul Celans Todesfuge o Schwarze Milch der Frhe wir trinken sie abends / wir trinken sie mittags unds morgerns wir trinken sie nachts/ wir trinken und trinken Black milk is often interpreted as the ashes from the concentration camps o The magic Shawl manages to keep the child alive until it is snatched away from it.

The shawl is often seen as a tallit, a Jewish prayer Shawl. Positive view: As long as religion is there, it sustains them. It gives the strength to survive incredible things. Negative view: Religion is taken away when they arrive in the concentration camps, in a way it can be interpreted as symbolizing the death of God. The story isnt Jewish if it isnt about religion The attention to language: o Animal symbolism (detachment, dehumanization) o the terminology used in the concentration camps: image of throwing a woman at the electric fence causing her death image of child being thrown at the electric fence description of diarrhea dripping from the upper bunk beds