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Trends in Israeli Literature

Trends in Israeli Literature. June Rodil Rachel Eccleston. Pre-State of Israel Literature Background. Hasidism ( Roughly 18 th Century ) Largely Inspired by Eastern European Jews Focused on Spirituality & Prayer with Aim of Moral Teaching Haskalah ( Roughly 19 th Century )

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Trends in Israeli Literature

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  1. Trends in Israeli Literature June Rodil Rachel Eccleston

  2. Pre-State of Israel Literature Background • Hasidism (Roughly 18th Century) • Largely Inspired by Eastern European Jews • Focused on Spirituality & Prayer with Aim of Moral Teaching • Haskalah (Roughly 19th Century) • “Hebrew Enlightenment” • Move towards the importance of Reason • Jewish Literary/Cultural Entrance into European Society/Civilization • Neo-Biblical Style– Limited Vocabulary (~5,000 words) • Into the 20th Century- WWI • Beginnings of Unity of Language • Expansion of Hebrew Vocabulary • Flexibility of Themes– “Hebrew Romanticism?”

  3. Pre-State of Israel Literature • Major contemporary spiritual concerns • loss of tradition, faith, and identity • inner uncertainties • tragedy and the grotesque • Conflict between traditional Jewish life/language and the modern world • Immigrant writers • Novels, short stories, poetry

  4. Pre-State of Israel Authors • Shmuel Yosef Agnon (1888-1970) • The Bridal Canopy (1931) • Yesteryear (1945) • Hayyim Nahman Bialik (1873-1934) • Poems (1901) • Poems (1908) • Yosef Haim Brenner (1881-1921) • In Winter (1904) • Breakdown and Bereavement (1920)

  5. 1940s & 1950s: War of Independence Generation • Conflicted between individualism and commitment to society and State • Social realism • “Palmach Generation” • Writers involved in war directly • Influenced “heroic mold” called for by times • Starting point of Hebrew/Israeli literary and cultural activity • Relationship between person and space, countrymen and the Land of Israel • Stream of Consciousness • Novels, essays, novellas, poetry

  6. 1940s & 1950s Authors • S. Yizhar (1916-) • Days of Ziklag (1958) • Midnight Convoy (1950) • Haim Gouri (1923-) “Israel’s Poet” • Flowers of Fire, Years of Fire (1949) • Poems of the Seal (1954) • Yehuda Amichai (1924-2000) • Now and in Other Days (1955)

  7. 1960s & 1970s: The Generation of the State • followed less ideological patterns • wrote more about the individual • psychological realism, allegory and symbolism • speculation and skepticism regarding conventions • Searching for “real individual” rather than conceptual ideal • Reaching out to Jewish Diaspora rather than just State of Israel • Existentialist struggle • Fiction, non-fiction, journalism, poetry, drama • Works translated into languages other than Hebrew/Aramaic

  8. 1960s & 1970s Authors • Amos Oz (1939-) • My Michael (1968) • The Hill of Evil Counsel (1976) • Avraham B. Yehoshua (1936-) • The Death of the Old Man (1962) • An Evening in May (1975) • Yehoshua Kenaz (1937-) • After the Holidays (1964) • The Great Woman of the Dreams (1973)

  9. 1980s & 1990s • Explosion of literary activity • Focus moves toward audience and individual and away from author • Holocaust • Detective Fiction, Suspense, Humor, Romance, Graphic Novels and Children’s Literature Genres Develop • Emergence of women authors • General Topics • Women’s Role in Jewish Tradition and Zionists Enterprise • Emerging themes • Arab-Christian Writers • The Ultra Orthodox World • Jerusalem’s Hassidic Courts • The Place of Immigrants from Arab Countries • Democracy & Righteousness During Constant Challenges

  10. 1980s & 1990s Authors • Aharon Appelfeld (1932-) • At One and the Same (1985) • Lost (1995) • David Grossman (1954-) • The Smile of the Lamb (1983) • The Book of Intimate Grammar (1991) • Savyon Liebrecht (1948) • Apples From the Desert (1986) • It’s All Greek to Me, He Said to Her (1992)

  11. Late 1990s & The New Millennium: The Post-Zionists • Younger Writers with universalistic themes • Alienation, Surrealism, Idiosyncrasies • Shift to Less Spiritual Concerns– The Good Life and the Pursuit of Happiness • Anarchic, Nihilistic, Iconoclastic • A More “European” Approach in Literary Style

  12. The Post-Zionist Authors • Etgar Keret (1967-) • The Bus Driver Who Wanted to be God & Other Stories (2001) • Pizzeria Kamikaze (2004) • Esty G. Hayim (1963-) • Our Second Life (1999) • Something Good Will Happen Tomorrow (2003) • Alex Epstein (1971-) • The Mountaineer’s Beloved (1999) • The Odyssey (2001)

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