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Robert Leiter

A Jewish American Canon

http://www.jewishworldreview.com -- ANYONE who has had even a passing acquaintance with college English courses over the last half-century has doubtless spent some time with a Norton anthology.

W.W. Norton, the New York-based publisher, has for years issued anthologies of literature dealing with English poetry and the American short story and all sorts of sub-genres throughout world literature.

Now, there is a Norton Anthology of Jewish American Literature, which took four editors four years of intense discussion and labor to bring to fruition. The hefty result weighs in at 1,221 pages.

One of the editors is Kathryn Hellerstein, senior fellow in Yiddish and Jewish studies at the University of Pennsylvania, who said in a recent interview that as far as she knows, this is the first comprehensive book of its kind.

She and her fellow editors — Jules Chametzky of the University of Massachusetts at Amherst, John Felstiner of Stanford University and Hilene Flanzbaum of Butler University — strove "to look at the literature in a comprehensive way. The book puts mid-17th century writing together with Yiddish, Hebrew and a taste of Sephardic literature, as well as Broadway lyrics and Jewish jokes."

The work begins in 1654 with a petition by Dutch Jews to Peter Stuyvesant and ends in the present with a short story by Allegra Goodman. Other writers anthologized include Anzia Yezierska, Woody Allen, Gertrude Stein, Meyer Levin and Tess Slesinger.

TO ORDER

Jewish American Literature: A Norton Anthology Jules Chametzky (Editor), John Felstiner (Editor), Hilene Flanzbaum (Editor), Kathryn Hellerstein (Editor) Hardcover- 1221 pages - W.W. Norton & Company

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Each of the four editors was assigned specific time periods to oversee, Hellerstein explained. "Hilene took the very earliest period and the present," she said. "I took early 19th century and the immigrant period. Jules wanted 1924 to World War II, and John was happy with 1945 to 1973.

"All of us were together in one room just once during the four years — that was in 1996, when we signed the contract in the offices of Norton. We did an enormous amount of Xeroxing and mailing of our choices to one another. I don't know how many trees we killed to make this anthology.

"There were lots of discussions on the phone and by e-mail. What Philip Roth story should we choose? Should we excerpt Henry Roth's novel Call It Sleep or use one of his short stories. Which poets should we include and how many poems? But each of us had final say over our sections."

According to Hellerstein, one of the questions that was foremost in the editors' minds was "What is teachable?"

"That meant weighing the old chestnuts against something new," she said. "In some sense, the anthology is a challenge to the idea of canon, I suppose."

The publisher, while aiming the work for the classroom, clearly also wants to attract the general reader. Hellerstein said ideally she would like to see the anthology used by "teachers interested in Jewish writers. Lots of different courses could come from this book. But I'd also like to see every Bar and Bat Mitzvah child receive it as a gift."

She paused and then with a chuckle said, "But I'd like every Jewish high school graduate to get it, too. And public libraries and synagogue libraries."

In fact, she said, she could think of lots of potential readers.