Jewish Writing:
A Reference and Critical Guide to Jewish Writing in the UK
In two volumes.
Revised and updated second edition
William Baker and Jeanette Roberts Shumaker
EER
Edward Everett Root Publishers Co. Ltd.
Vol.2 ISBN 9781912224104 Hardback £55.00 Order
216 x 140mm. 264pp.
Vol.1 ISBN 9781912224098 Hardback £55.00 Order
216 x 140mm 266pp.
About these books
The first detailed reference and critical guide to Anglo-Jewish writing. It offers accurate and up-to-date information on the lives and accomplishments of its subjects, as well as expert summaries and criticism of their works.
Baker and Shumaker eschew theoretical formulations to offer a comprehensive view of many important poets, dramatists, fiction and nonfiction writers, as well as literary critics and other scholars.
Each chapter gives an overview of the similarities and differences of the writers’ Anglo-Jewish experiences and how those experiences influenced them.
Writers covered in the first volume include, in the first section, the Victorians and pioneers E. O. Deutsch, B. L. Farjeon, Israel Gollancz, Leonard Merrick, Lazarus Aaronson, and others.
The second section covers four critical voices: Vivian de Sola Pinto, Jacob Isaacs, Q. D. Leavis, and David Daiches.
In the third, novelists Louis Golding, Alexander Baron, Gerda Charles, and Bernice Rubens. In the fourth, poets such as Karen Gershon, Dannie Abse, Jon Silkin, Ruth Fainlight, Philip Hobsbaum, and A. C. Jacobs. The final section encompasses playwrights and more, including Bernard Kops, Arnold Wesker, Harold Pinter, Tom Stoppard, A. A. Alvarez, and Gabriel Josipovici.
The concluding bibliography is divided into a detailed alphabetical enumerative listing of writers’ work followed by a listing of critical works about them. A comprehensive index in volume two draws the volume together.
Volume 1. Contents: Introduction. 1. Pioneers: E. O. Deutsch, B. L. Farjeon, Israel Gollancz, Leonard Merrick, and Lazarus Aaronson. 2. Four Critical Voices: Vivian de Sola Pinto, Jacob Isaacs, Q. D. Leavis, and David Daiches. 3. Novelists: Louis Golding, Alexander Baron, Gerda Charles, and Bernice Rubens. 4. Poets: Karen Gershon, Dannie Abse, Jon Silkin, Ruth Fainlight, Philip Hobsbaum, and A. C. Jacobs. 5. Playwrights and More: Bernard Kops, Arnold Wesker, Harold Pinter, Tom Stoppard, A. A. Alvarez, and Gabriel Josipovici. Works Cited and Bibliography: Primary; Secondary.
Volume 2. Contents: Preface; 1. Nineteenth-Century Writers. 2. Fin de Siècle to Mid-Twentieth Century Writers. 3. Twentieth-Century Writers. 4. Contemporary Writers. Works Cited and Bibliography: Primary; Secondary. Index to both volumes.
About the authors
William Baker is distinguished university professor emeritus at Northern Illinois University and Visiting Professor at Zhejiang University, PRChina. The author or co-author of over 150 refereed articles and 31 books, he has written extensively on Pinter, Stoppard and Kops and other Anglo-Jewish writers including many contributions to The Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. His other work includes books on George Eliot, Wilkie Collins, Jane Austen and William Shakespeare. He edits George Eliot-George Henry Lewes Studies and co-edits The Year's Work in English Studies.
Jeanette Roberts Shumaker was appointed Associate Professor at San Diego State University, California, in 1992 and assistant dean in 1995. She is a highly experienced American English language educator and recipient of an Outstanding Faculty Contribution award San Diego State University Alumni Association (1994). Her recent books (with William Baker) include Leonard Merrick: A Forgotten Novelist's Novel and Bernard Kops: Fantasist, London Jew, Apocalyptic Humorist.
Reviews
“Often neglected, forgotten or overlooked, the writers in this essential reference and critical guide to Anglo-Jewish writing by Baker and Shumaker find a new and important prominence. In its comprehensiveness and detail, the two volumes provide an indispensable text that will undoubtedly become the standard work for a set of writers known and unknown.”
Ira Nadel, Professor of English, University of British Columbia.
"this two-volume collection discusses Anglo-Jewish authors and their works... this is a useful historical and chronological survey of this literary subgenre. Especially noteworthy are the bibliography of primary and secondary sources and the comprehensive two-volume index. As both a reference work and a source for literary analysis, this set fills a void in the literature on Anglo-Jewish authors. Recommended. Upper-division undergraduates through faculty." CHOICE. Donald Altschiller, Boston University.