Jewish women writers and British culture
- Categories
- Book/Boek
- Creator
- Tylee, Claire M. > (ed.)
- Contributor
- Atfield, Rose J.
- Publish Year
- 2006
- Shelfmark
- GR BR 54 2006
- Thesaurus
- schrijvers, literatuur, cultuur, Engels, jodendom, joodse vrouwen, anti judaïsme, vrouwbeelden, 20e eeuw
- Description
- This collection of twelve essays on Jewish women writers and British culture refer to both women's studies and Jewish studies. A variety of British women writers were brought together and considered through the lens of their Jewish background. The result is to reveal unsuspected connections between authors as diverse as the cross-dressing actress Naomi Jacob and the former professor of art history at the Courtauld, Anita Brookner, between the Anglo-American poets Denise Levertov and Mirna Loy, the Welsh zionist novelist, Lily Tobias, and the Israeli children's writer, Lynne Reid Banks: between the translator, Elaine Feinstein, the cellist, Anita Lasker-Wallfisch, and the dramatist Diane Samuels. Jewish women writers in Britain such as Bernice Rubens, Linda Grant, and Ellen Galford have distinguished themselves, writing about the family, Israeli wars, and lesbian relations in highly individual ways. As women, the authors discussed here deal with women's issues such as marriage, motherhood, sisterhood, and female relationships. However, these are refracted through a common Jewish concern with anti-Semitism, with the Holocaust, and with remembering the collective past. Like female Jewish authors in America, they also debate the attractions and disadvantages of Jewish family life. What distinguishes British writers is the ambivalent attitudes they display toward 'Englishness' and dominant British culture.