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Jewish
Writers
Jewish
writing has occupied an important place
in American literature. The major Jewish
writers who have contributed to the
national literature of America are;
Soul Bellow, Norman Mailer, Bernard
Malamud, I.B singer, Philip Roth and
others. American English literature
has been contributed by these major
writers. To call these writers merely
Jewish is not good and yet not to call
them Jewish is also not good. Still
because they are Jewish, Jewish culture
or elements
of Jewishness come here and there in
their writings. If we call them American
writers, Jewish cultural markers get
lost, and if we call them typically
Jewish by considering their cultural
elements, the national elements that
we find in their writings get background.
The
Jewish Writers and intellectuals appeared
in American literature mainly after
the great immigration of 1881-1924.
Though many Jewish writers entered American
literature in the 1920s and 1930s, the
major contemporary Jewish writers appeared
only in the 1940s. It was mainly between
1945 and 1955 that the Jewish writers
in America come forward as a producers
of and spokesmen for an influential
modern literature.Now it is obvious
that most of the Jewish fiction writers
started their career after Second World
War.Therefore,
their experiences were quite similar.
And another common fiction factor that
they shared was their cultural identity
of Jewish group. These two common factors
represent the Jewishness of Jewish writers.
And this Jewishness is the most important
feature of Jewish fiction. When Jews
entered America, they strictly led a
traditional life. But from the 18 th
century due to various waves of Enlightment,
liberalism, socialism etc the Jews revolted
against the traditional life. The first
and second generation Jews in America
detached itself from holy books and
got associated with the new ideas and
moral charges .Moreover, the second
generation Jews not only broke away
from the tradition but also brought
secular revolutionism. So another feature
of Jewish Fiction is breaking away from
the tradition by getting associated
with new idea and moral challenges,
and also by bringing secular revolutionism.Besides
breaking away from the tradition, the
adoption of English language is yet
another feature of Jewish fiction. Especially,
the second generation Jewish writers
adopted English language, and the adoption
was made not just to enter the American
mainstream but also to release the long
suppressed yearning in to the world
since the English language is intonation.The
second generation Jewish writers as
mentioned above, belongs to the post
war era. In this era, the important
feature of the Jewish fiction is the
horror brought by the World War. All
the postwar Jewish American fictions
are their themes dealt with war; brutality;
depression, unemployment, the individual
sentiments and sensibilities. In addition
, a new feature developed in postwar
Jewish fiction were modern dilemma-
disillusionment with ideology and politics;
isolation both from one’s own
past and from an increasingly rich society.
Those Jewish writers who started their
career early in the 1940s, are definitely
affected by the great Depression the
rise of fascism, Spanish civil war and
above all, the World Wars . So, the
fiction written by Jews in the next
three decades share a common feel of
disaster and a sense of loss and deracination.
With such sentiments, it was quite natural
for the Jewish writers to write favoring
socialism.
SAUL
BELLOW Bellow
is a Jewish American novelist and a
winner of noble prize for literature
in 1976. Bellow’s novels depict
the struggle of individuals to preserve
their personal identities in an indifferent
society. Bellow’s first novel
is Dangling Man,
which is the perfect copy of existentialism
showing how modern people are alienated.
This novel is also the symbol of the
end of pre-war ideology.The
Victim, Picaresque of the Adventure
of Augie March, Seize the day, Herzog,
Humboldt’s Gift
are his mostly admired novels of Bellow.
Saul Bellow being a postwar writer is
stuck with the theme like alienation,
victimization and marginality. Therefore
the important feature of his work is
that they are based on the note of isolation
and drift. For example his first novel
Dangling Man
is the perfect copy of existentialism
showing how modern people are alienated.
Bellow, a dominating literary figure
of the 50s in American literature, widens
the vision and leads himself to the
mainstream American literature. Bellow
is the one with varieties, who represents
many renowned mainstream writers like
Faulkner, who is both historicist and
regionalist. Bellow’s Augie
March reflects Mark Twain’s
visionary sense as we find in his Huckleberry
Finn. His masterpiece
Herzog is
a perfect piece of Emersonian influences
with transcendental vision. And in Dangling
Man and The
Victim, he follows Hemingway
closes to the Anglo- American writing
.Hence in Bellow’s works, we find
varieties of influences, and he deals
with the subject mater like war, holocaust
and the decline of the west. Not only
Bellow, but overall Jewish writer in
the post war decades seem to stick to
the terms like alienation, victimization
and marginality and so Jews were known
as ‘the universal estrangement
of man’.
BERNARD
MALAMUD Malamud
is an American novelist. He is also
a short story writer. His books focus
on Jewish experiences in America. Like
Bellow Malamud started his career after
Second World War so their experience
about war is quite similar. Moreover
they both attempt to establish the cultural
identity for Jewish group. For these
reasons, Jewishness is the main feature
found in the works of Malamud as well
as Bellow. Bernard Malamud being a post
war writer includes the theme of alienation,
but he uses schlemiel character to indicate
this alienation. In this respect, he
is different from other Jewish writers
because he shows the success of schlemiel
character and yet, he emphasizes up
on the Christian values. Malamud believes
that Jewish people should not hide their
identity. That is why he is very different
Jewish writer because he shows the success
of schlemiel characters and yet, he
emphasizes up on the Christian values.
Though his basic attitude to life is
Christian, he has not forgotten his
identity as Jew. Sex denied and the
moral of denying the sex is the basis
of Malamud’s stories. He usually
uses epiphany and the language of poignancy
(regret and sadness). Due to this poignancy,
his fictions depict pessimism-he is
reluctant to have happy ending in his
works. Also, he sees Jewish people degenerating
morally- this may even be the cause
of his pessimism. However all the heroes
of Malamud dream to get their dream
girls, who are physically appealing
and sexually pure as well. Finally another
quality of Jewishness that we find in
Malamud’s novels is ambivalence.
When he has a hero looking for pleasure-dream
girl-he has this thirst on the one hand
while on the other that is not achievable.
This leads to ambivalence in Malamud’s
fictions. Malamud’s fictions are:
The Natural, The Assistant,
A New Life, The Fixer, The Magic Barrel,
Idiot’s First. Read
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