British-Jewish Writing Today

Gilbert, Ruth

doi:10.1007/978-1-137-37473-8_1

Cited by 2 publications

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“…As Ruth Gilbert has noted, Israel served as an 'imaginary landscape' for British Jews, onto which they could project their desires, fears, and ideology. 88 territories as a 'cancer in the heart of Israeli society'. 91 This advertisement drew quick condemnation from others within the GZO, and more broadly in Glasgow Jewish communities.…”

Section: The Rise Of Glaswegian Zionismmentioning

confidence: 99%

Zionism, <em>Aliyah</em>, and the Jews of Glasgow: Belonging and Believing in Postwar Britain

Schaffer¹

2019

Shofar

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This article unpicks the meanings of Zionist identification in postwar Britain, making a case study of the Jewish community of Glasgow. It questions how the existence of Israel, especially in times of crisis, impacted on British-Jewish communities and individuals, and what these impacts may tell us about Jewish postwar lives. In particular, the article explores the ways in which Zionism interacted with British society, culture, and politics, particularly as regards issues of multiculturalism, ethnicity, and counter-culture. Focusing on material from the Scottish Jewish Archives Centre, and oral history interviews with Jews that migrated to Israel from Glasgow, the article considers the role of Zionism in rearticulating and redefining Jewishness in the postwar period, notably in the context of evolving Holocaust consciousness, and declining religiosity across the country. It unpicks the workings and meanings of diasporic subjectivities, analysing changing Jewish thinking about belonging and home. Ultimately, I argue, Glaswegian Zionism should be understood as a manifestation of postwar Britishness, which informed and underwrote evolving diasporic consciousness within Jewish communities. British Jews engaged with Israel with motivations and anxieties that reflected their lives in multicultural Britain more than Israeli culture or politics. This reality shaped the nature of British Zionism, explains why comparatively few British Jews made aliyah, and why the overwhelming majority supported Israel on their own terms from their British homes.

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Section: The Rise Of Glaswegian Zionismmentioning

confidence: 99%

Zionism, <em>Aliyah</em>, and the Jews of Glasgow: Belonging and Believing in Postwar Britain

Schaffer¹

2019

Shofar

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“…11 Gilbert, who, in her survey of contemporary British-Jewish writing, frequently refers to Howard Jacobson's work, affirms: 'Writers of the immediate post-war generation, such as Linda Grant and Howard Jacobson question the complexities inherent in categorizing British-Jewish identity but seem, nevertheless, to have a workable notion of what Jewishness is and how to place themselves within this identification'. 12 Her description of Jacobson's sense of Jewish identity is absolutely accurate. Jacobson is proud of being labelled a Jewish writer and does not hesitate to describe himself as 'entirely and completely Jewish'.…”

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“…Throughout the novel the narrator uses the expression 'Bug and Dniester' to refer to his Jewish inheritance, reflecting the irresolvable tension that Gilbert identifies in much contemporary British-Jewish writing: 'how to be in the here and now whilst respecting the traces of a past which are, more often than not, located elsewhere'. 49 Although Oliver's grandmothers are very different, there is something they have in common: both of them are very religious. The narrator, who, like Jacobson, is not an Orthodox Jew and does not believe in God, mocks their religious beliefs: 'Gifts she was unable to accept in her heart.…”

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“…65 Gilbert has argued that the references to Jewish diet that we find in many contemporary Jewish writings are a means of reconnecting with the past for diasporic Jews: 'Jewish food memories are deployed in various ways: to signify nostalgia for childhoods and cultures that have passed; or, more satirically, to suggest an awareness of the clichés that Jews can fall into when caught in the mists of memory'. 66 According to Gilbert, Jacobson tries to embrace both approaches in his commentary on 'Dinner in the Diaspora'. Thus Jacobson asserts: Not a particle of Jewish food can pass a Jew's lips .…”

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The Mighty Walzer

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2022

European Judaism

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Howard Jacobson is a British author who is proud of being labelled a Jewish writer and does not hesitate to describe himself as ‘entirely and completely Jewish’. He believes that English-Jewish writers should address directly the challenge of being Jewish, which is precisely what he does in The Mighty Walzer (1999). The novel shows once again Jacobson’s greatness as a comic novelist and thus reinforces his assumption that the ingenious, joking Jew is the Jew in essence. Like many scholars, Jacobson believes that self-aimed humour has allowed Jewish people to cope with the paradoxical nature of their culture and historical situation. In The Mighty Walzer Jacobson proves to be the Jew par excellence by joking about everything from religion to food, making fun of the contradictions and incongruities of Jewish life.

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British-Jewish Writing Today

Cited by 2 publications

References 2 publications

Zionism, <em>Aliyah</em>, and the Jews of Glasgow: Belonging and Believing in Postwar Britain

Zionism, <em>Aliyah</em>, and the Jews of Glasgow: Belonging and Believing in Postwar Britain

The Mighty Walzer

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