Oh Other Where Art Thou: Spatial Awareness in Hebrew and English Literature of the Nineteenth to Mid Twentieth Century

The analyses in this thesis explore similarities and differences in Jewish (and later Jewish-Israeli) and British literary texts from the nineteenth to the mid-twentieth centuries. The comparison is based on two connections between the two cultures: the first is the shared mythical roots, and the second the spatial and historical connection between the two cultures in relation to (post)colonialism. The research examines literary means that convey and consider alterity, and the manner in which the location of the monstrous Other is indicative of the relationship of the respective imagined community and sovereignty. This investigation focuses on the employment of certain Gothic tropes, specifically the use of the setting as a means of exploring and expressing individual and collective identities. A connection between the British and Jewish cultures surfaces in nineteenth to mid-twentieth century literary use of Gothic elements. Furthermore, the comparative analysis will show that the texts in Hebrew and English examined in this thesis similarly utilise Gothic tropes in order to explore concerns of modernity.

This thesis re-establishes the inherent links between the Jewish and British cultures, which manifest in similar use of spatial metaphors and ancient myths for the exploration of the angst modernity. These similarities stem not only from the cultural connection, but are the result of the two nations’ preoccupation with sovereignty at an era when they underwent opposite processes of immigration and colonisation. Both literatures utilise Gothic tropes because the Gothic is a genre that is predominantly engaged with social critique and spatial awareness. The interplay between space, myth, and language is exposed as fundamental for the (re)construction of identities in relation to spatial awareness. These issues continue to be relevant in contemporary discussions of identities.