Literature

Ari Hoffman explores the expansive visions of Jewish peoplehood embedded in two major, recently published novels

Jewishness, antisemitism, popular culture and Russian television in the postwar era? Historian Maya Balakirsky Katz explains.

In tribute to his son's hanahat tefilin and Bar Mitzvah, Lehrhaus Consulting Editor Jeffrey Saks explores a little-known, mysterious practice that appears in Agnon's short story Two Pairs.

Eileen Watts examines the similarities between Mary Shelley's Frankenstein and Rav Soloveitchik's Lonely Man of Faith.

What do Adam, Enkidu, and Reish Lakish all have in common? Eli Putterman explores.

Aryeh Klapper recreating a patriarchal voice.

In his latest for the Lehrhaus, Dan Ornstein creatively imagines the story of the Talmudic sage Rabbi Yohanan through his teachings on the Book of Job. The short story is followed by a reflection on the methodology and power of "contemporary midrash."

The question of whether or not your writing is Jewish is not up to you, because writing ultimately belongs to the reader. Krauss’ avatar answers Ozick perfectly: “Jewish literature would have to wait, as all Jewish things wait for a perfection that in our hearts we don’t really want to come.” In the end, perhaps all we can do is kvetch and vacillate between different answers to the question of what is Jewish literature—because, of course, the answer was never the point.

Eileen Watts explores how Bernard Malamud's "The German Refugee" amplifies the themes of Tisha B'Av.

Mitchell First reviews Yehuda Landy's Purim and the Persian Empire.