Jewish American Fiction: A Primer

In English grad school, we all find our own little idiosyncratic corners of the literary universe. In my case, I ended up focusing on Jewish American fiction, writing a dissertation on that subject. Here at the Sectarian Review, we’ve covered the topic a bit, doing a show on Chaim Potok’s The Chosen, and a retrospective on the life and career of Philip Roth. But when thinking of twentieth-century American literature, Jewish writers and the sub-genre they created are not merely significant. This body of work is profound and essential to understanding American literature.
Recently a listener asked me for some recommendations for someone just breaking into this particular body of work. I love the conversation with my listeners, so I’m glad to help out. Here are ten works I would start with if you’re interested (in no particular order).

1. Goodbye, Columbus and Five Short Stories, by Philip Roth. In truth, Roth could merit his own top-ten list, but that is the subject of another blog post. Here you get Roth at his most accessible, telling tightly-plotted, humorous, profound stories about the Jewish American experience with cultural assimilation. These early works lack the intoxicating style of late Roth, with his digressive, “Rothian” rants, but the stories are no less compelling.
   
2. All Other Nights, by Dara Horn. Horn is that envy-inducing figure who seems to be brilliant at everything. An accomplished academic and critic who somehow finds time to research and write exciting fiction while raising a family, Horn is a wunderkind. This historical novel (based on true events) follows a Jewish soldier in the Union Army during the Civil War who is caught up in a series of assassination plots (including one to kill Lincoln) and intrigue. As if the story isn’t adventurous enough, it is also packed with profound meditations on loyalties divided by historical events.
   
3. Lazar Malkin Enters Heaven, by Steve Stern. While most American Jewish writing is associated with New York or New Jersey, Stern stands out as a true Southerner. The worlds of his Jewish tales are located largely in Memphis which provides a fascinating backdrop for Stern’s brand of magical realism. This collection of short stories reminds one of the great Cynthia Ozick in style, and the humor Stern brings to them is downright hilarious.
   
4. Mr. Sammler’s Planet, by Saul Bellow. Bellow is a giant, not only of Jewish fiction, but in American letters in general. Often cited with Faulkner or Toni Morrison as America’s greatest novelist (though he was born in Canada), his corpus is vast. I’ve included this novel with the neophyte in mind. Not as stylistically innovating as Augie March nor as well-known as Herzog, this novel is a tighter, easier-to-digest work that follows a Holocaust survivor, Mr. Sammler, as he struggles to make sense of the New Left and changing political times. This book is controversial and provocative (with a particularly risky and possibly offensive view of race relations) but it will live with you long after you read it.
   
5. Bread Givers, by Anzia Yezierska. The Jewish novel really finds its footing during the period of massive Jewish immigration in the early 20th Century. Yezierska is one of those pioneers and her narrative of a newly arrived Jewish girl is a classic of both Jewish fiction and immigrant novels in general. Sara Smolinsky’s story of “becoming American” is exhilarating, tragic, and profound.
   
6. The Yiddish Policemen’s Union, by Michael Chabon. The Jewish American novel is as vibrant as ever, if not moreso, with many younger novelists picking up the tradition inherited from Roth, Bellow, and Malamud. Perhaps the most famous is Michael Chabon, who has become one of America’s most famous writers. To me, this is his masterpiece. A postmodern historical fiction about an alternate universe in which the State of Israel has failed and all the world’s Jews live in Sitka, Alaska - “The Frozen Chosen.” Furthermore, the novel is written as a noirish detective novel in which the hero, Meyer Landsman, but discover the truth behind a murder conspiracy that ultimately leads back to Palestine. A hilarious, heartbreaking, life-affirming book.
   
7. Mazel, by Rebecca Goldstein. This novel follows three maternal generations of a Jewish family. Sasha, the theatrical diva-grandmother from the old country, Chloe, her hippy American daughter, and Phoebe, Chloe’s mathematician daughter who makes conventional life-choices which stun her incorrigible grandmother. Sasha is one of Jewish fictions great, memorable characters and the chaotic wisdom she imparts to her family and to the reader is invaluable.
   
8. The Assistant, by Bernard Malamud. I was going back and forth about whether to include this great novel or Malamud’s amazing collection of short stories, The Magic Barrel, so let me say...read both. But the novel in question is a powerful classic about the desperate lives of an immigrant family in New York. Morris Bober is the owner of a small store in a declining neighborhood in Brooklyn who becomes father/mentor to a troubled Italian employee, Frank. Frank falls for Bober’s daughter, who desperately longs to escape her dreary life. A beautiful story about decay and desperation - Malamud’s specialty.
   
9. The Pagan Rabbi and Other Stories, by Cynthia Ozick. A profoundly religious writer, Cynthia Ozick fiction is like looking into the face of eternity. Her magical realist style combined with a devout Orthodox Jewish faith makes her work utterly unique. In addition, her work unflinchingly looks at the very meaning of Jewishness in a way that many Jewish authors avoid. This particular collection, is among her greatest work (though you should also check out her non-fiction, which shows her to be among our greatest thinkers and critics as well as a masterful fiction-writer). The title story in particular, about a Rabbi who falls in love with a tree is one that will forever haunt your religious imagination.
   
   10. Call it Sleep, by Henry Roth. This is Modernist fiction at its most humane and eloquent. Written in the thirties (and stylistically reminiscent of Faulkner), the book was basically forgotten until a re-printing in the mid-Sixties, when it became universally recognized as an American classic. The immigrant novel follows young David Schearl and his difficult journey to manhood growing up in brutal economic circumstances with a cruel father. The book’s climax is one of the most profoundly religious experiences in all of American literature.
   
   
   Again, just consider this a primer, meant to give you some idea of the breadth of this amazing body of work. Please take some time to look into these books and let us know what you think.​