Anti-Semitism and Israel in British Jewish Fiction: Perspectives on Clive Sinclair’s 'Blood Libels' (1985) and Howard Jacobson’s 'The Finkler Question' (2010)

Recently Howard Jacobson’s Booker Prize winning novel The Finkler Question (2010) and Peter Kosminsky’s controversial TV mini-series The Promise (2011) have forcefully re-introduced the issue of Israel to British Jewish cultural creativity. Both need to be understood not only in the context of contemporary British Jewish cultural creativity but also of the earlier literary engagement with Israel in British Jewish fiction. Focusing in particular on Clive Sinclair’s Blood Libels (1985) and Jacobson’s novel, this article traces notions of Israel in British Jewish fiction since its establishment in 1948 to the present day.