Metonymies of Jewish Postcoloniality: The British Mandate for Palestine and Israel in Contemporary British Jewish Fiction

Stähler, Axel (2009) Metonymies of Jewish Postcoloniality: The British Mandate for Palestine and Israel in Contemporary British Jewish Fiction. Journal for the Study of British Cultures, 16 (1). pp. 27-40. ISSN 0944-9094.

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Abstract

Jewish and British histories were never more fatefully intertwined than during the 1930s and 40s, but the period of the British Mandate in Palestine receives relatively little attention outside specialist circles and does not feature centrally in the many debates about Empire, decolonisation and diaspora. This is not necessarily (just) a result of non-Jewish amnesia, but also relates to the fact that for many British Jews the anti-colonial struggle of the Zionists in Palestine were (and perhaps still are) as acute an embarrassment as the contentious politics of the state of Israel. Since the late 1980s, however, contemporary British Jewish writers have repeatedly made this period and relationship the focus of their narratives. The article argues that British Jewish fictions of the historical colonial encounter of the Jews with the British during the Palestine Mandate bring about the convergence not only of English (or British) and Jewish identification patterns, but also of English and Jewish constructions of the past. The contribution discusses works by Linda Grant, Bernice Rubens and Jonathan Wilson.

Item Type:	Article
Subjects:	P Language and Literature > PN Literature (General) P Language and Literature > PR English literature
Divisions:	Faculties > Humanities > School of European Culture and Languages Faculties > Humanities > School of European Culture and Languages > Comparative Literature
Depositing User:	Axel Stahler
Date Deposited:	28 Aug 2012 10:29
Last Modified:	29 Aug 2012 09:49
Resource URI:	http://kar.kent.ac.uk/id/eprint/30290 (The current URI for this page, for reference purposes)

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