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Ten Mite Rd., Just W. of Telegraph VISA' Certified Kosher Metropolitan Kashruth Council 355-0088 AL MAN % Southfield "The Original" In The New Orleans Mall 10 Mile & Greenfield Mon.-Wed. & Sat. 10-7 Thurs. & Fri. 10-9 Sun. 12-5 • 559-7818 44 West Bloomfield On The Boardwalk Orchard Lake Road South of Maple Mon.-Wed. & Sat. 10-7 Thurs. & Fri. 10-9 Sun. 12-5 • 626-3362 FRIDAY, DECEMBER 16, 1988 Downtown Birmingham 111 S. Woodward South of Maple Mon.-Wed. & Sat. 10-7 Thurs. & Fri. 10-9 Sun. 12-5 • 647-0550 Word War One Continued from preceding page two great lights of American Jewish fiction, Saul Bellow and Philip Roth, both of whom declined invitations to participate in the conference, have conflicted and ambivalent relationships to their own Jew- ishness and • to Jewish life. In addition, many of the writers who did participate are marginal in the sense that they are not especially favored by the American Jewish masses or not read more within the Jewish community than outside it. Herman Wouk and Chaim Potok, two novelists who combine commitment to the community with broad popularity in it, were not invited or even mentioned at the conference. According to Richard Siegel, associate executive director of the National Foundation for Jewish Culture, Wouk had been briefly considered and Ozick had suggested Potok. Both were ultimately rejected, presumably for lack of sufficient intellectual credentials. "They're typists, not serious writers," Irving Howe growled privately, and he characterized Wouk in particular as "a hack — an enemy of serious writing." As if to emphasize that lines were being drawn, the conference was tightly con- trolled to keep "the writers" (as the conference organizers called the panel participants) separated from those who came to hear them. All sessions were in panel or lecture format, and there were no small-group discussions; preference in the brief question-and-answer periods was given to "the writers"; and no event was scheduled that would allow informal social- izing between "the writers" and the audience. Between the afternoon and eve- ning sessions "the writers" were whisked off to dinner with wealthy local patrons. Even the chartered buses that took parti- cipants to evening events were carefully segregated; when several of "the writers," by design or mistake, ended up on the wrong bus, the conference organizers in- sisted that they leave their seats and move to the correct bus. Questioned about this, Richard Siegel explained that the conference had as its primary aim to bring "the writers" to- gether; other attendees were merely "an audience" to help inspire and motivate the dialogue. The effect, however, of imposing so hierarchical a structure was — since most of "the audience" were also writers in their Jewish communities — to keep "the writers" separate from their natural constituency, many of whom had traveled far distances to hear them. A more open conference might even have expanded the possibilities of dialogue, since, according to several of "the writers," despite the careful choreography little significant dialogue occurred offstage between the Israeli and North American literati. "A very elitist event," summed up one woman in the audi- ence; numerous others, including some of "the writers," echoed this evaluation. Nonetheless, the conference as a whole generated extraordinary intellectual energy and excitement. The first such gathering of its kind, it also established a solid groundwork for future events in the National Foundation for Jewish Culture's year-long cultural exchange program between Israeli and North American Jew- ish literary figures. In general, the "Writer in the Jewish Community" conference highlighted the divergent literary traditions and historical Cynthia Ozick serted that too few Jews, in America and Israel, have sought to enhance Israel's position in the media and among intellectuals. experiences of Israeli and North American Jews as well as their real conflicts over religion, politics and worldview. But the conference also made clear that any split between the two Jewries is a work of fiction. Not only have the two commu- nities drawn closer since the Six-Day War, but each clearly needs the other for spir- itual ballast and moral support. Despite the disagreements, a number of the parti- cipants, from both sides of the Atlantic, made strong statements emphasizing the indivisible unity of the Jewish people. If the formal dialogue had a definable out- come, then, it was perhaps the acknow- ledgement that Israelis and North Ameri- cans are long-term partners in Jewish life. North American participants included, in addition to those already named, fiction writers Max Apple, Rosellen Brown, Joanna Kaplan, Leonard Michaels, Hugh Nissenson and Nessa Rapoport; poets Stanley Kunitz and Harvey Shapiro; trans- lators Chana Block and John Felstiner; scholars Robert Alter and Alan Mintz; and writer-editor Leon Wieseltier of the New Republic. Israeli participants included writers Ruth Almog, Hanoch Bartov and David Schutz; poets Meir Weiseltier and Dahlia Ravikovitch; critics Yael Feldman, Chana Kronfeld and Eli Shaltiel; translator Carmit Gai; and writer and Bible scholar Meir Shalev. A number of the Israelis are now teaching in American universities, which seems to suggest that, at least on one side, the dialogue is already well underway. 0 David Margolis writes from Los Angeles.