Humor and Despair in Modern Jewish Fiction

Catalog description

This course will examine the literary trajectory of the American Jew from his immigrant beginnings to his contemporary lifestyle with respect to the depth of human feeling. The fiction we will be reading focuses on characters who straddle two emotional camps: the joyful and the melancholy. We will investigate character development, narrative style, and the ways in which Jewishness informs the central themes of humor and despair. With fiction by Henry Roth, Delmore Schwartz, Philip Roth, Cynthia Ozick, Saul Bellow, Gerald Shapiro, Woody Allen and others.