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Wisse takes us
on an exhilarating journey through language and
culture, penetrating the complexities of Jewish
life as they are expressed in the greatest
Jewish novels of the twentieth century, from
Isaac Babel to Isaac Bashevis Singer, from Elie
Wiesel to Cynthia Ozick.
The modern
Jewish canon Wisse proposes comprises those
books that convey an experience of Jewish
actuality, those in which "the authors or
characters know and let the reader know that
they are Jews," for better or worse.
Wisse is not content merely to evaluate the
great books of Jewish literature; she also links
the works together to present a new kind of
Jewish history, as it has been told through the
literature of the past hundred years. She tells
the story of a multilingual, multinational
people, one that has experienced an often
turbulent relationship with Hebrew (the
liturgical and scriptural language) and Yiddish
(the commonplace vernacular tongue), as well as
with the numerous languages spoken by Jews
around the world. Wisse insists that language
informs the essential meaning of a Jewish work,
creating and ratifying political and religious
alliances, historical and cultural circumstance,
and methods of interpretation.
Drawing from a broad sweep of twentieth-century
Jewish fiction, Wisse reintroduces us to the
deeper side of much-beloved books that remain
touchstones of Jewish identity. Through her eyes
we reencounter old friends, including:
Destined to be a classic in its own right, one
that reshapes the way we think about some of the
classic works of the modern age, The Modern
Jewish Canon is a book for every Jewish reader
and for every reader of great fiction. |
