A Look At Jewish Literature
Looking back from
[Bellow's] Sammler
to Sholem
Aleichem's Tevye, we
see how far Jewish
writing has come in
this century The
parent with whom
we started out was
also faced with revo-
lutionary challenges
from his children
and their generation.
In him, too, "laugh-
ter and trembling
are so curiously min-
gled that it is not
easy to determine
the relations of the
two," a definition
which Bellow uses to
describe literature
that is characteristi
cally Jewish.
It is even possible
to suggest a literary
connection between
Feferl (Peppercorn),
the revolutionary
who married Tevye's
second daughter, and
Lionel Feffer the fre-
netic tummler, who
involves Mr. Sammler
in his schemes.
But Tevye, wear-
ing millennia of tra-
dition as lightly as
his skin, was always
looking to the
future, expecting his
children to bring
. him greater happi-
ness than he had
known. Sammler
(zamler is Yiddish
for collector), with
his vast collection of
languages, acquain-
tances, experiences
and knowledge, is
always looking back,
haunted by the
knowledge of how
bad things can get.
From "The
Modern Jewish
Canon: A Journey
Through Language
and Culture"
d,
12/29
2000
56
Approach
SANDEE BRAWARSKY
Special to the Jewish News
T
evye is in. So are Nathan
Zuckerman, Arthur Sammler
and Joseph K. But Yakov Bok
and Frank Alpine are out.
In Harvard scholar Ruth Wisse's new
book, The Modern Jewish Canon: A Journey
Through Language and Culture (Free Press;
$28), she presents her view of the most sig-
nificant and enduring works of prose fic-
tion of the 20th century, from the books of
Sholem Aleichem to Philip Roth.
Making selections and compiling a
canonical list immediately invokes curiosity
about what's on it and what's not. This
book is interesting not only for Wisse's
selections, but for her weaving of the story
of 20th-century Jewish experience, in its
textured complexity, through a study of
fine works of fiction.
"Modern Jewish literature is the reposito-
ry of modern Jewish experience," she
writes. "It is the most complete way of
knowing the inner life of the Jews."
For Wisse, a professor of Yiddish litera-
ture and comparative literature at Harvard
University, Jewish literature is multilingual,
and includes works in Yiddish and Hebrew,
as well as other languages in which Jews
have felt at home as writers, including
French, German, Russian and English.
She writes that "in Jewish literature the
authors or characters know and let the
reader know that they are Jews."
In a telephone interview from her home
in Cambridge, Mass., Wisse explains that
she intended this book for a general reader,
and understands that not all readers will
have read all of the works she mentions.
"One of my hopes is that interested peo-
ple will work the process backward as it
were, perhaps stimulated by the things I
write about. I hope to bring them back to
the text. This book was conceived as an
introduction to the works themselves."
Wisse, the author of four books includ-
ing If I Am Not for Myself The Liberal
Betrayal of the Jews and the editor of four
others, explains that this book grew out of
her designs of university courses in modern
Jewish literature, which bring together
works from different languages.
cible of Jewish literature in the
It was when she was corn-
next phase," she says.
pleting the book that she
Although there's a component
realized that this was a book
of Jewish memory in all of the
about a modern Jewish
works cited, she explains that
canon. "Since the whole idea
these works really deal with "the
of the canon is under much
actuality and vibrancy of Jewish
discussion in the teaching of
experience in the here and now,"
literature in general, I did
throughout the century. She
want to make the case that
explains that those writers she has
there's a potential of a canon
selected have "interpreted Jewish
of our own in modern litera-
experience in ways that are
ture," she says.
Ruth Wisse: 'In Jewish
enlightening, relevant, appealing
Once the idea occurred to
literature the authors
and most profound," although
her, she recast the book. In
or characters know and
not necessarily all positive.
developing a canon, she asserts let the reader know
It may seem surprising to
that Jewish literature is parallel that they are Jews."
some
that Bernard Malamud's
in importance and quality to
(Yakov Bok) and The
The
Fixer
other world literatures.
Assistant (Frank Alpine) are not considered
While her book was in process, Harold
part of the canon. Malamud identifies the
Bloom's The Western Canon appeared,
Jew in these works, she writes, "exclusively
which tried to establish a standard, author-
and ideologically with the archetype of the
itative list covering Western literature.
sufferer and on this basis imagines the Jew
While Bloom looks only at the aesthetics
as the ideal Christian."
of a work as a basis for inclusion, Wisse
In her chapter "Writing Beyond
looks at what the work expresses about
Alienation,"
Wisse focuses on Saul Bellow,
Jewish experience. Another sign that some-
Cynthia Ozick and Philip Roth, including
thing about canonical lists is in the air is
Ozick in the trio in which Malamud has
that the National Yiddish Book Center
long been identified.
recently announced that it is creating a list
Wisse cites Lionel Trilling, who informs
of 100 of the most important Jewish
books; Wisse was asked to join the panel of her ideas about literature, but his novel
Middle of the Journey doesn't get included.
judges.
She quotes a great line of his as a young
The Modern Jewish Canon is organized in
man: "Being a Jew is like walking in the
a mostly chronological order, by languages.
wind or swimming: you are touched at all
Wisse is talented at describing and analyz-
points and conscious everywhere."
ing the individual works — their literary
She says that if this insight had informed
value, historical context, their role in the
his fiction, "he would have secured a place
author's oeuvre, the author's life — and
of honor in the modern Jewish canon."
linking them to something larger.
But his characters aren't Jewish, even
She begins with Sholem Aleichem, focus-
though his themes are.
ing on Tevye the Dairyman, which she char-
"We will not try to re-inject into any
acterizes as "the most inexhaustible work of
work
the lifeblood of a people that its
modern Jewish fiction that anticipates
author emptied out," she writes.
most of modernity's challenges to Jewry"
Proust is also not included. She explains
Tevye shows off "the genius of Yiddish
that many critics consider him a Jewish
wit and humor" in talking about his life,
writer even though he was baptized, for his
his wife, his many daughters.
mother came from a Jewish family, and his
From Tevye, she shifts to writers working
work
is informed by his knowledge of
in other languages, featuring Franz Kafka
French
Jewry.
writing in German and Yosef Haim
It
is
not
his harsh description of Jews in
Brenner writing in Hebrew, and then to
Within a Budding Grove that excludes him
Isaac Babel, writing in Russian.
from the canon for Wisse, for she includes
In her chapter "Between the Wars," she
other works in Hebrew and Yiddish with
looks at literature of and about Poland in
harsh descriptions, but the fact that his narra-
the 1930s, and she focuses on the three
tor excludes himself from the Jewish fate. She
Singers: Isaac Bashevis Singer, Israel Joshua
writes,
"Proust's work will continue to give
Singer and their lesser known sibling,
pleasure
from outside the Jewish canon."
Esther Kreitman.
In a postscript to the book, Wisse reiterates
She covers ghetto diaries and then shifts
that the book is a "signpost on an unfinished
to books in English, including the immi-
road," that she too has thought of additional
grant fiction of Mary Antin, Abraham
works that might have been included.
Cahan, Henry Roth and, later, to contem-
"A book on the canon is by definition
porary writers, some not so well known
open-ended," she writes. "Let readers take
like the Canadian A.M. Klein.
it as an invitation to set out on their own
The final part, "A Chapter in the
journeys
through Jewish language and cul-
Making," takes up Israeli literature. "The
ture."
Hebrew language will be the major cru-
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