In a Maelstrom: The History of Russian-Jewish Prose (1860-1940) by Zsuzsa Hen�tyi (review)

Abstract

SEER, Vol.88, No. 4, October 2010 Reviews Henétyi,Zsuzsa. In a Maelstrom: TheHistory ofRussian-Jewish Prose(1860-1940). CEU Press,Budapestand New York,2008.xv + 316pp. Notes.Biographiesofauthors . Appendix.Bibliography. Index.£21.95. In thenineteenth century, Russification through educationwas partof the imperial government's endeavours to integrate theJewsintoan ideologically and economically acceptablemainstream. WhileYiddishremainedthemain or evenonlylanguageofthemajority ofRussia'sJewish population, Russian was increasingly spokenbythemodernized Jews,and someofthememerged as Russian literati.The AmericanYiddish and EnglishwriterAbraham Cahan, himself a man ofRussianculture, remembered seeingin Vilna Lev Levanda,a pioneerRussian-Jewish author, whose'writings constituted a small literary worldwhichwas neither RussiannorJewish'(TheEducation of Abraham Cahan, Philadelphia, PA, 1969,p. 135).Initially, suchauthorswereregarded as a phenomenon ofJewishliterature andjournalism, buttheirvoicebegan increasingly to be heard also in non-Jewish Russian intellectual circles.In 1908,theroleofJewsintheRussianworldofletters waswidely and heatedly discussed in thepress,following a provocative articleby KorneiChukovskii (see Evgeniia Ivanova, Chukovskii i ^habotinskii: Istoriiavzaimootnoshenii v tekstakh i kommentariiakh, Moscow/Jerusalem, 2005). The 1922book, Russko-evreiskaia literatura, byVasiliiL'vov-Rogachevskii, laid thegroundwork forattempts to describethe Jewish presence in Russian literature. Accordingto thisschool of thought, onlyauthorsofJewishoriginqualifiedfora place in RussianJewish sub-literature. On theotherhand,therearescholars whoquestionthe elimination ofnon-Jewish authors' works with Jewish content (see,e.g.,Dora Rytman,'Russian-Jewish Literatureas a Mirrorof the Fate of Russian Jewry:The Special Case of Ilya Ehrenburg',unpublishedPhD, Brown University, 1993). ZsuzsaHenétyi tries to squarethecirclebyconcentrating on thehistory of Russian-Jewish prose. In reality, however, sheisinterested inexclusively Jewish (which'maysignify religious, national and cultural identity', p. 32)authors whose writings manifest their Jewishness. As a result, her corpusdoes notinclude stories andnovelsbysuch'inconsistent' Jewsas Il'ia Ehrenburg, VasiliiGrossman ,David Khait,Aleksandra Brushtein and Anatolii Rybakov, letalonethe half-Jewish AleksandrMeilakhs (Melikhov)and the non-Jewish Anatolii Kuznetsovand I. Grekova. It is hard to understand the past tensein Henétyi'scharacterization of Grigory Kanovichwho (longlifeto him!)continues tobe activein literature: 'The last Russian-Jewish writer,or more exactlythe last who may be regarded as such(a Lithuanian Jewwriting inRussian)wasprobably Grigorii Kanovich,who emigrated to Israelin 1993,but he wroteexclusively about subjectsof the past, a bygoneworld' (p. 220). Kanovich'smissionas the 'lastRussian-Jewish writer' also remains unclear.Forinstance, Dina Rubina, who moved to Israel in 1990,writesboth about the bygoneSoviet and REVIEWS 709 contemporary Jewishlife(compareAnna P. Ronell, 'Some Thoughtson Russian-Language IsraeliFiction:Introducing Dina Rubina', Proofiexts, 26, 2008, 2, pp. 197-231).Althoughthe Union of Russian-Language Writers, founded inIsraelin 1971, publishes several literary periodicals, Henétyi argues that'Israeliliterature written in Russianis an altogether different, peculiar phenomenon withlittleawarenessoftheone-time Russian-Jewish literature investigated inthisbook'.In other words,sheisreadytofindaffinity between Lev Levanda,Vladimir Jabotinsky and Friedrich Gorenstein, butcannotfind a place in thisgroupforDina Rubina. Some of Zsuzsa Henétyi'sstatements are inaccurate.It is incorrect, forinstance,to statethatin the 1920s'the word "Jewish" itself began to be treatedas taboo due to theincreasingly sharpcontradiction betweenthe slogansofSocialismand theanti-Semitism characterizing theSovietUnion, and thefearfollowing from thatcontradiction' (p. 178).Especially sincep. 175 carries theinformation abouthundreds ofYiddishschoolsandseveral publishinghouses .The bibliographic apparatusofIn a Maelstrom appearssometimes as a randomcollection ofpublications thathappenedto be on theauthor's bookshelf. Thus, outdatedsources on Birobidzhan(Chimen Abramsky's articles c. 1970s)and a student workbyE. Shkol'nikova on theSovietshtetl introducethe reader to erroneousinformation about the year ofJewish resettlement to theFar East and thenumberofSovietYiddishnewspapers. MaximVinaveris a grandname foranyhistorian ofJewishpoliticallifein lateimperialRussiabut,accordingto Zsuzsa Henétyi, his 'name is familiar from theautobiography ofMarc Chagall' (p. 119). Allinall,readers mayfind useful separatevignettes devotedtosuchwriters as Yakov Rombro, AleksandrKipen, Semyon Hekht and Lev Lunts. However,In a Maelstrom is byno meansthe history ofRussian-Jewish prose. Skirball Department ofHebrewandJudaicStudies New YorkUniversity G. ESTRAIKH Love,Jeff. Tolstoy: A Guide forthe Perplexed. Continuum, LondonandNewYork, 2008. ix + 178pp. Notes.Bibliography. Further reading.Index.£12.99 (paperback). Is itpossibleto achievea definitive understanding ofLev Tolstoi?Of all the 'accursedquestions' saidtobesetRussianliterary andphilosophical activity of thelasttwocenturies, thisis surely one ofthemorethorny. Forwe think of Tolstoiandwe think ofcontradiction: novelist, sermonizer; aristocrat, pilgrim; hedgehog,fox.So it is intriguing to finda slimpaperbackthatpurports to offer theperplexedamongus a guidethrough thesecontradictions. The Guides forthePerplexed seriesintendsto offer 'clear, concise and accessible introductions to thinkers, writers and subjectsthatstudents and readerscan findespecially challenging', as thebackcoverstates, and is pitchedat a level above existing introductory or student guideseriesin an acknowledgement ...