Yohanan Petrovsky-Shtern
- Published in print:
- 2009
- Published Online:
- October 2013
- ISBN:
- 9780300137316
- eISBN:
- 9780300156072
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Yale University Press
- DOI:
- 10.12987/yale/9780300137316.001.0001
- Subject:
- History, Cultural History
This book explores the Jewish contribution to, and integration with, Ukrainian culture, focusing on five writers and poets of Jewish descent whose literary activities span the 1880s to the 1990s. ...
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This book explores the Jewish contribution to, and integration with, Ukrainian culture, focusing on five writers and poets of Jewish descent whose literary activities span the 1880s to the 1990s. Unlike their East European contemporaries—who disparaged the culture of Ukraine as second-rate, stateless, and colonial—these individuals embraced the Russian- and Soviet-dominated Ukrainian community, incorporating their Jewish concerns in their Ukrainian-language writings. The author argues that the marginality of these literati as Jews fuelled their sympathy toward Ukrainians and their national cause. Providing extensive historical background, biographical detail, and analysis of each writer's poetry and prose, he shows how a Ukrainian-Jewish literary tradition emerged. Along the way, the author challenges assumptions about modern Jewish acculturation and Ukrainian–Jewish relations.Less
This book explores the Jewish contribution to, and integration with, Ukrainian culture, focusing on five writers and poets of Jewish descent whose literary activities span the 1880s to the 1990s. Unlike their East European contemporaries—who disparaged the culture of Ukraine as second-rate, stateless, and colonial—these individuals embraced the Russian- and Soviet-dominated Ukrainian community, incorporating their Jewish concerns in their Ukrainian-language writings. The author argues that the marginality of these literati as Jews fuelled their sympathy toward Ukrainians and their national cause. Providing extensive historical background, biographical detail, and analysis of each writer's poetry and prose, he shows how a Ukrainian-Jewish literary tradition emerged. Along the way, the author challenges assumptions about modern Jewish acculturation and Ukrainian–Jewish relations.
