Jewish American Literature
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Jewish American Literature
Jewish American literature holds an essential place in the literary history of the United States. It encompasses traditions of writing in English, primarily, as well as in other languages, the most important of which has been Yiddish. While critics and authors generally acknowledge the notion of a distinctive corpus and practice of writing about Jewishness in America, many writers resist being pigeonholed as "Jewish voices." Also, many nominally Jewish writers cannot be considered representative of Jewish American literature, one example being Isaac Asimov. Beginnings Beginning with the memoirs and petitions composed by the Sephardic immigrants who arrived in America during the mid 17th century, Jewish American writing grew over the subsequent centuries to flourish in other genres as well, including fiction, poetry, and drama. The first notable voice in Jewish- American literature was Emma Lazarus, whose poem "The New Colossus" on the Statue of Liberty became the great hymn ...
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Abraham Cahan
Abraham "Abe" Cahan (Yiddish: אַבֿרהם קאַהאַן; July 7, 1860 – August 31, 1951) was a Lithuanian-born Jewish American socialist newspaper editor, novelist, and politician. Cahan was one of the founders of ''The Forward'' (), an American Yiddish publication, and was its editor-in-chief for 43 years. During his stewardship of the ''Forward,'' it became a prominent voice in the Jewish community and in the Socialist Party of America, voicing a relatively moderate stance within the realm of American socialist politics. Early life and childhood Abraham Cahan was born July 7, 1860, in Paberžė in Lithuania (at the time in Vilnius Governorate, Russian Empire), into an Orthodox, Litvak family. His grandfather was a rabbi in Vidz, Vitebsk, his father a teacher of Hebrew and the Talmud. The devoutly religious family moved to Vilnius in 1866, where the young Cahan studied to become a rabbi. He, however, was attracted by secular knowledge and clandestinely ...
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American Literature
American literature is literature written or produced in the United States of America and in the colonies that preceded it. The American literary tradition thus is part of the broader tradition of English-language literature, but also includes literature of other traditions produced in the United States and in other immigrant languages. Furthermore, a rich tradition of oral storytelling exists amongst Native American tribes. The American Revolutionary Period (1775–1783) is notable for the political writings of Benjamin Franklin, Alexander Hamilton, Thomas Paine, and Thomas Jefferson. An early novel is William Hill Brown's ''The Power of Sympathy'' published in 1791. Writer and critic John Neal in the early-mid nineteenth century helped advance America's progress toward a unique literature and culture, by criticizing predecessors like Washington Irving for imitating their British counterparts and influencing others like Edgar Allan Poe. Edgar Allan Poe took American ...
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Call It Sleep
''Call It Sleep'' is a 1934 novel by Henry Roth. The book is about a young boy growing up in the Jewish immigrant ghetto of New York's Lower East Side in the early 20th century. Although it earned acclaim, the book sold poorly and was out of print for close to 30 years. It received a second life when it was reviewed by literary critic Irving Howe on the front page of ''The New York Times Book Review'' on October 25, 1964. Its paperback edition, published by Avon, sold over 1 million copies. The novel was included on ''Times 2005 list of the 100 best English-language novels written since 1923. Synopsis ''Call It Sleep'' is the story of a Galician Jewish immigrant family in New York in the early part of the 20th century. Six-year-old David Schearl has a close and loving relationship with his mother Genya but his father Albert is aloof, resentful and angry toward his wife and son. David's development takes place between fear of his father's potential violence and the degrada ...
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Joshua Cohen (writer)
Joshua Aaron Cohen (born September 6, 1980) is an American novelist and story writer, best known for his works '' Witz'' (2010), ''Book of Numbers'' (2015), and ''Moving Kings'' (2017). Cohen is the recipient of the 2022 Pulitzer Prize for Fiction, for his novel '' The Netanyahus'' (2021). Life Cohen grew up in Atlantic City, New Jersey, spent his summers in Cape May, New Jersey and went to school at Trocki Hebrew Academy before transferring to Mainland Regional High School. He currently lives in Red Hook, Brooklyn. He reads both German and Hebrew and has translated works in both languages into English. Work and career He attended the Manhattan School of Music and studied composition. Cohen does not have an MFA, and has expressed disdain for the degree. In 2017, Granta Magazine named him to its decennial list of the Best Young American Writers. Cohen lived in various cities in Eastern Europe between 2001 and 2006, working as a journalist. Cohen's works have received acclaim. '' ...
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Ayelet Waldman
Ayelet Waldman ( he, איילת ולדמן, born December 11, 1964) is an Israeli-American novelist and essayist. She has written seven mystery novels in the series ''The Mommy-Track Mysteries'' and four other novels. She has also written autobiographical essays about motherhood. Waldman spent three years working as a federal public defender and her fiction draws on her experience as a lawyer. Biography Ayelet Waldman was born in Jerusalem, Israel. Her grandparents on both sides were Jewish immigrants to North America from Ukraine early in the 20th century.Wilensky, Sheila"Connections speaker is an engaging, witty chronicler of women's lives", ''Jewish Tucson'', February 12, 210. Retrieved August 27, 2010. Her father, Leonard, was from Montreal, Canada, but was living in Israel when he met her mother, Ricki. After they married, they moved to Jerusalem.Espinoza, Galin"Author, Author" ''People'', December 16, 2002. Retrieved August 25, 2010. After the Six-Day War in 1967, the family ...
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Michael Chabon
Michael Chabon ( ; born May 24, 1963) is an American novelist, screenwriter, columnist, and short story writer. Born in Washington, DC, he spent a year studying at Carnegie Mellon University before transferring to the University of Pittsburgh, graduating in 1984. He subsequently received a Master of Fine Arts in creative writing from the University of California, Irvine. Chabon's first novel, '' The Mysteries of Pittsburgh'' (1988), was published when he was 25. He followed it with '' Wonder Boys'' (1995) and two short-story collections. In 2000, he published '' The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay'', a novel that John Leonard would later call Chabon's magnum opus. It received the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction in 2001. His novel ''The Yiddish Policemen's Union'', an alternate history mystery novel, was published in 2007 and won the Hugo, Sidewise, Nebula and Ignotus awards; his serialized novel '' Gentlemen of the Road'' appeared in book form in the fall of the same year. ...
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Paul Auster
Paul Benjamin Auster (born February 3, 1947) is an American writer and film director. His notable works include ''The New York Trilogy'' (1987), '' Moon Palace'' (1989), ''The Music of Chance'' (1990), '' The Book of Illusions'' (2002), '' The Brooklyn Follies'' (2005), ''Invisible'' (2009), '' Sunset Park'' (2010), '' Winter Journal'' (2012), and '' 4 3 2 1'' (2017). His books have been translated into more than forty languages. Early life Paul Auster was born in Newark, New Jersey,Freeman, John"At home with Siri and Paul", '' The Jerusalem Post'', April 3, 2008. Retrieved September 19, 2008. "Like so many people in New York, both of them are spiritual refugees of a sort. Auster hails from Newark, New Jersey, and Hustvedt from Minnesota, where she was raised the daughter of a professor, among a clan of very tall siblings." to Jewish middle-class parents of Polish descent, Queenie (née Bogat) and Samuel Auster. He is the first cousin of the late political writer Lawrence Auste ...
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Ellis Island
Ellis Island is a federally owned island in New York Harbor, situated within the U.S. states of New York and New Jersey, that was the busiest immigrant inspection and processing station in the United States. From 1892 to 1954, nearly 12 million immigrants arriving at the Port of New York and New Jersey were processed there under federal law. Today, it is part of the Statue of Liberty National Monument and is accessible to the public only by ferry. The north side of the island is the site of the main building, now a national museum of immigration. The south side of the island, including the Ellis Island Immigrant Hospital, is open to the public only through guided tours. In the 19th century, Ellis Island was the site of Fort Gibson and later became a naval magazine. The first inspection station opened in 1892 and was destroyed by fire in 1897. The second station opened in 1900 and housed facilities for medical quarantines and processing immigrants. After 1924, Ellis Island ...
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Judaism
Judaism ( he, ''Yahăḏūṯ'') is an Abrahamic, monotheistic, and ethnic religion comprising the collective religious, cultural, and legal tradition and civilization of the Jewish people. It has its roots as an organized religion in the Middle East during the Bronze Age. Modern Judaism evolved from Yahwism, the religion of ancient Israel and Judah, by the late 6th century BCE, and is thus considered to be one of the oldest monotheistic religions. Judaism is considered by religious Jews to be the expression of the covenant that God established with the Israelites, their ancestors. It encompasses a wide body of texts, practices, theological positions, and forms of organization. The Torah, as it is commonly understood by Jews, is part of the larger text known as the ''Tanakh''. The ''Tanakh'' is also known to secular scholars of religion as the Hebrew Bible, and to Christians as the " Old Testament". The Torah's supplemental oral tradition is represented by later t ...
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Secularism
Secularism is the principle of seeking to conduct human affairs based on secular, naturalistic considerations. Secularism is most commonly defined as the separation of religion from civil affairs and the state, and may be broadened to a similar position seeking to remove or to minimize the role of religion in any public sphere. The term "secularism" has a broad range of meanings, and in the most schematic, may encapsulate any stance that promotes the secular in any given context. It may connote anti-clericalism, atheism, naturalism, non-sectarianism, neutrality on topics of religion, or the complete removal of religious symbols from public institutions. As a philosophy, secularism seeks to interpret life based on principles derived solely from the material world, without recourse to religion. It shifts the focus from religion towards "temporal" and material concerns. There are distinct traditions of secularism in the West, like the French, Turkish and Anglo-American m ...
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Philip Roth
Philip Milton Roth (March 19, 1933 – May 22, 2018) was an American novelist and short story writer. Roth's fiction—often set in his birthplace of Newark, New Jersey—is known for its intensely autobiographical character, for philosophically and formally blurring the distinction between reality and fiction, for its "sensual, ingenious style" and for its provocative explorations of American identity. He first gained attention with the 1959 novella ''Goodbye, Columbus''; the collection so titled received the U.S. National Book Award for Fiction.Brauner (2005), pp. 43–47 He became one of the most awarded American writers of his generation. His books twice received the National Book Award and the National Book Critics Circle award, and three times the PEN/Faulkner Award. He received a Pulitzer Prize for his 1997 novel ''American Pastoral'', which featured one of his best-known characters, Nathan Zuckerman. '' The Human Stain'' (2000), another Zuckerman novel, was awarded ...
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Chaim Potok
Chaim Potok (February 17, 1929 – July 23, 2002) was an American author and rabbi. His first book '' The Chosen'' (1967), was listed on ''The New York Times’'' best seller list for 39 weeks and sold more than 3,400,000 copies. Biography Herman Harold Potok was born in Brooklyn, New York, to Benjamin Max (died 1958) and Mollie (née Friedman) Potok (died 1985), Jewish immigrants from Poland. He was the oldest of four children, all of whom either became or married rabbis. His Hebrew name was Chaim Tzvi (חיים צבי). He received an Orthodox Jewish education. After reading Evelyn Waugh's novel ''Brideshead Revisited'' as a teenager, he decided to become a writer (he often said that the novel ''Brideshead Revisited'' is what inspired his work and literature). He started writing fiction at the age of 16. At age 17 he made his first submission to the magazine ''The Atlantic Monthly''. Although it was not published, he received a note from the editor complimenting his work. H ...
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