Jewish American Lit in the Sixties

For the second year in a row, I'm going to be teaching a 3-week summer course at Hebrew Union College, mainly to rabbinical students. This time the topic is Jewish American Literature of the 1960s, with "the sixties" stretching a few years back into the fifties and on into the seventies. Here's my course description:

“The Sixties” in Jewish American Literature: Assimilation & Rebellion

The decade of the 1960s was a period in which Jews entered the mainstream of American society and contributed to American culture to an unprecedented extent. At the same time, Jewish Americans were also instrumental in the formation of the counter-culture which stood as a critique of mainstream American values. Torn between assimilation and rebellion, the generation of Jewish American writers which came of age during this period reflect their historical situation in a great range of literary genres and styles. This generation, largely the children of hard-working first and second generation Jews who anxiously sought to fit into American life, both acknowledge and reject the drama of their parents’ struggle for middle-class status and social acceptance. They seek to redefine their Jewishness in relation to the turmoil and promise of the sixties. This course will consider a variety of texts and authors of the sixties (give or take a few years), and attempt to situate them in terms of their Jewish identity and cultural impact. Authors will include Philip Roth, Grace Paley, Bernard Malamud, Allen Ginsberg and Bob Dylan.

As you can see, it's going to be quite a mix. I'll be starting with Goodbye, Columbus and moving on to Ginsberg's Kaddish, including the various responses of other Jewish poets to that poem (most notably Allen Grossman's great review). The Malamud stories will probably include "The Angel Levine" and "Black Is My Favorite Color," for a consideration of Jewish / African-American relations during that period. Paley's feminist perspective is likewise crucial, and Dylan, well, it's a no-brainer, especially given "Highway 61" ("God said to Abraham / Kill me a son..."). Does anyone have any other suggestions? I'd really like to show a good film...

Spanked!

I've been meaning to post something here about why I haven't been posting here, which would lead me into a whole long riff about Jewishness and middle age and eating BLTs during Pesach. To be honest, though, I've been preoccupied most recently with a different sort of ethnic issue.

A couple of weeks ago, you see, the Latino Poetry Review went live on line. In its inaugural issue, my big essay from Parnassus: "Gringo with a Baedeker, Cortez in Kevlar." Just go to the main page and click "essays"; you'll find it. After you do--or maybe before--click on "Letters to the Editor." There you'll find a long response by Javier Huerta, a poet and graduate student who was deeply offended by my dismissal (on aesthetic grounds) of the seminal Chicano poem I am Joaquin by Rudolfo "Corky" Gonzales. Huerta's letter began as a post to his blog, which you can find here, followed by 20+ comments. He's since posted another meditation sparked by the piece; more blog responses to the essay-review show up at the Blog of Many Names by C. S. Perez, and I've gathered them for you (the ones so far) here.

[PS: just found this, another blog response, considerably more pissed off. "Save your empty gestures," this poet says of my apologies. Sorry, Mr. Corral--still a few of those to go.]

Now, as you'll see in the comments on each of those posts, as well as in the Letters page and over at Romancing the Blog, I've responded several times to the controversy, each time with an apology. Huerta, you see, has me dead to rights: I did a lousy job writing about the Gonzales poem, failing not only to question my own first impressions of it, but also to be the sort of "chameleon critic" that I've always tried to be. (I have some quotes from him, and comments on them, over at Say Something Wonderful.)

What I can't help but wonder, though, is how much of this fracas might stem from my bringing a particularly Jewish (secular, resistant, sketpical) sensibility to bear on some of these poems. Is my hesitation before, and my impulse to scoff at, certain kinds of identity poems rooted in my embrace of a certain version of goyish aesthetics? Or does it blossom from a "Debate with the Rabbi" impulse that assumes all group identities to be problematic, ripe for unsettling or complication?

Reading white? Or reading Jewish?
Eccovi! Judge ye! I'm all ears.

Recovering 'Yiddishland' Now Available!

I don't wish to be totally self-serving (considering I forgot how to access this blog & have just stumbled on it, right now!).... but I do want to let y'all know that my book is out from Syracuse University Press, and -- it is very pretty, if I do say so, myself.

"Recovering 'Yiddishland': Threshold Moments in American Literature" (2008).

If any of you have a chance to look at it, I'd love to hear your response.

Best to you all,

Merle Bachman

Finkelstein on Cross-Cultural Poetics

FYI, my radio interview with Leonard Schwartz and reading from Passing Over is now up at Penn Sound here. Happy listening.

Burton Hatlen

Burton Hatlen, Professor of English at the University of Maine, and director of the National Poetry Foundation, died on Monday, January 21st. Serious readers of the Objectivists and of modern American poetry in general are bound to be familiar with Burt's work. His essays on Zukofsky, Oppen, and Reznikoff remain fundamental to the field, and he edited a number of major critical collections. His criticism is remarkably wide-ranging: from Renaissance literature to Bram Stoker to Philip Pullman to his former student, Stephen King. He was a gracious and gentle man, immensely supportive of younger critics. I first got to know Burt when I was a grad student finishing my dissertation at Emory: having learned of my work on Oppen, he asked me to contribute to George Oppen: Man & Poet, which he was editing at the time. I was thrilled that such an accomplished scholar was giving me serious attention. According to his students, he was an extraordinary teacher too. As Robert Creeley would say, Burt was a true member of the company. An account of his life and career can be found here.

BIG JEWISH PETRY READING THURS JAN 31

A BIG JEWISH POETRY READING coming up at the 92nd st Y in NYC Jan 31--the poets will be in NY for the annual AWP meeting.
They are (modesty aside) a brilliant group. Note the discount if you order with code ZEEK.

8:oo PM Thursday Jan 31

Praise, Grumble, Shmooze, Lament: The Voices of 21st Century Jewish Poetry
Lexington Avenue at 92nd Street
Cost: $26.00 / $12.00 with discount code "ZEEK"
Co-presented with Zeek: A Jewish Journal of Thought and Culture. Hear some of today's most eloquent, provocative and meaningful Jewish poets. The program features readings by established and emerging poets, including Alicia Ostriker, Rodger Kamenetz, Robin Becker, Jacqueline Osherow, Dan Bellm, Patty Seyburn, Philip Terman, Scott Cairns, Jay Michaelson and Richard Chess. Reception follows. Get your tickets NOW at 92y.org or 212-415-5500.

A New Book by Henry Weinfield

Henry Weinfield's Without Mythologies: New & Selected Poems & Translations has just been published by Dos Madres Press. Readers of this blog who are familiar with Henry's poetry, criticism and translations will understand the significance of this book. It contains work from 1967 to 2006, including most of The Sorrows of Eros (1999) and a generous gathering of earlier work, including poems from In the Sweetness of the New Time (1980) from the press I ran long ago, House of Keys. Henry is one of my oldest friends and it would be a bit redundant of me to sing his praises, but for those interested in my thoughts on his work, I wrote a substantial review of The Sorrows of Eros which appeared in Denver Quarterly 35.2 (Summer 2000). Henry's new work has turned increasingly toward contemporary political events, and as I have noted here, such pieces as "Praise and Lamentation" are some of the most important and provocative Jewish poems to come along in some time. As usual, Robert and Elizabeth Murphy of Dos Madres have produced a beautiful book, a perfect complement to Henry's inimitable lyricism. This book is a must.