"Der richtige Riecher": The Reconfiguration of Jewish and Austrian Identities in the Work of Doron Rabinovici

Abstract

In a country such as Austria, whose 10,000 Jews represent a tiny fraction of a total population of nearly eight million, the claim that great significance for either nationhood or Jewish identity lies in the literature of contemporary Jewish authors might seem tenuous. But close examination of recent Jewish literature reveals more relevance to these issues of identity than the numbers would indicate. By either challenging or remaining within standard boundaries and definitions of identity, these works provide a unique commentary on the formation of minor literature and its role in the transformation of both majority and cultures. As one ofthe first writers to address this phenomenon, Franz Kafka maintained that a small literature, due to its size, lacks the revered forces of a classic, traditional of the (such as Goethe), but succeeds because it actually provides more of an opportunity for the author to shape an identity through writing. Kafka claimed that the lack of outstanding talents rendered the of the small literature more lively, allowing a writer to break free of traditional rules and tropes ofthe classical language to shape the consciousness of the collective. Later theorists built upon this idea to define a small or minor literature more concretely, by a use of deterritorialized language, a connection between the writer and political events, and a writer's representation of collective values. 1 The examination of the literature of contemporary Jewish writers Doron Rabinovici and Ruth Kluger against such theories of cultural difference and nation formation will illustrate the unique ways in which this literature may or may not transform the very condition it describes, namely, the relationships between Jews and non-Jewish Austrians on both private and public levels. As will be shown, the works of Rabinovici, a writer of the post-Holocaust generation, serve to transform this relationship, by rejecting standard definitions of minority identity, and by subverting the common notion that 'ewish and Austrian are two distinct, firmly bounded categories. The work of Kliger, however, as a writer of an earlier generation, reveals her desire or need to maintain much of the traditional definitions of 'Jew and Austrian of her youth. As this paper will argue, the recent works of both authors not only pinpoint the complex issues embedded in common definitions of what is 'Jewish and what is Austrian, but also provide useful examples of applications of contemporary cultural discourse to literature, highlighting its important role in discussions of cultural difference and national identity in Austria and beyond. At stake in this discussion is not whether the literature discussed fits a strict, exclusive list of criteria for minor literature, but rather the fact that this and other theories of a similar nature can provide a specific vocabulary which allows for a deeper understanding of the political impact of literature on identity formation. In her autobiographical book weiter leben: Eine Jugend, published in 1992 in Germany, emigrant writer Ruth Kliger tells the story of her life, as the sheltered daughter of middle-class Jewish parents in Vienna, where she was born, to her subsequent internment in three concentration camps, and then as a displaced person and American professor of German literature. Kluger's comments on the importance of the German to her, as an emigrant to the United States writing in German, and as a Jewish victim of Nazi persecution, show how can serve as a cultural barrier as it simultaneously provides a source of identity. For Kluger, who was only thirteen years old when she entered Auschwitz, both reciting and writing German poetry were important parts of her early survival skills, even before her deportation. Especially after she was no longer allowed to attend school, as a Jewish child in Vienna, German and books kept her company while her mother worked. …