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.
Author Biography:
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. 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.
