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Postwar Stories: How Books Made Judaism American
The period immediately following World War II was an era of dramatic transformation for Jews in America. At the start of the 1940s, President Roosevelt had to all but promise that if Americans entered the war, it would not be to save the Jews. By the end of the decade, antisemitism was in decline and Jews were moving toward general acceptance in American society.Drawing on several archives, magazine articles, and nearly-forgotten bestsellers, Postwar Stories examines how Jewish middlebrow literature helped to shape post-Holocaust American Jewish identity. For both Jews and non-Jews accustomed to antisemitic tropes and images, positive depictions of Jews had a normalizing effect. Maybe Jews were just like other Americans, after all.At the same time, anti-antisemitism novels and ?Introduction to Judaism? literature helped to popularize the idea of Judaism as an American religion. In the process, these two genres contributed to a new form of Judaism--one that fit within the emerging myth of America as a Judeo-Christian nation, and yet displayed new confidence in revealing Judaism's divergences from Christianity.
- GenresHistory
310 pages, Hardcover
First published January 1, 2024
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Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews
August 4, 2024
American Jews growing up in the second half of the 20th c. could expect to see certain books in their home libraries: Wouk's This Is My God and Marjorie Morningstar, Gentlemen's Agreement by Laura Z. Hobson, Uris' Exodus, and maybe Steinberg's As a Driven Leaf.
Gordan explains in her excellent book how all of these publications, in addition to Life Magazine's famous article on an Orthodox Jewish American family, contributed to helping Jews and non-Jews alike learn what it meant to be Jewish. She also highlights how it was after WWII that American writers and society developed the idea of the three "American" religions--Protestant, Catholic, and Jew, and how books helped bring Judaism into that triumvirate.
It's well worth a read by anyone interested in religion in America, and how we got to where we are today. It may be of particular interest to 21st c. Jewish adults who might not understand or appreciate the middle class, middle brow literature that led to their place in American society.
Gordan explains in her excellent book how all of these publications, in addition to Life Magazine's famous article on an Orthodox Jewish American family, contributed to helping Jews and non-Jews alike learn what it meant to be Jewish. She also highlights how it was after WWII that American writers and society developed the idea of the three "American" religions--Protestant, Catholic, and Jew, and how books helped bring Judaism into that triumvirate.
It's well worth a read by anyone interested in religion in America, and how we got to where we are today. It may be of particular interest to 21st c. Jewish adults who might not understand or appreciate the middle class, middle brow literature that led to their place in American society.
March 27, 2026
This scholarly book examines what the author, Rachel Gordan, calls anti-antisemitism writing, in novels and non-fiction books about Judaism, and in magazines, starting just after World War II and going into the 1950s.
One of the most famous examples of fiction of the period is the 1947 Gentleman's Agreement, by Laura Z. Hobson, a novel about a gentile journalist who goes undercover as a Jew to write about the experience of antisemitism and exclusion in New York City and the upper class suburbs of Connecticut. It was a tremendous bestseller, and was made into an Oscar-winning movie with Gregory Peck in the leading role.
Another is the 1958 Exodus, by Leon Uris, about the founding of the State of Israel following the voyage of the immigration ship "Exodus". It too was made into a highly successful film, released in 1960, starring Paul Newman in the central role. Though I was a young child in pajamas in the back of my parents' car at a drive-in theater, I still remember the impression made on me by its stirring music and vivid graphic opening.
Gordan examines other best-selling fiction by such writers as Herman Wouk, the author of Marjorie Morningstar and The Caine Mutiny, who also wrote the non-fiction This Is My God, his interpretation of Judaism (also a bestseller), and similar non-fiction texts by rabbis of the period. Wouk was a practitioner of Modern Orthodox Judaism, and the other books examined Judaism from the Reconstructionist and Reform viewpoints.
In addition, she describes the special features on Judaism (and other major religions) in mainstream magazines like Time, Life, and Look, which were revolutionary in bringing a Jewish perspective into the mainstream of American life.
On the whole, it presents a positive view of the evolution and mainstreaming of Jewish life in America after World War II, and onward, until the last decade or so, when we began to see obvious evidence of increased antisemitism once again, typified by the Tree of Life synagogue attack in Pittsburgh in 2018. It is a highly informative and fascinating book, but it was written before the October 7, 2023 attack on Israel by Hamas and the ensuing events. Since then, everything has changed, and the hopeful sentiments of this book must, sadly, be viewed as nostalgia.
One of the most famous examples of fiction of the period is the 1947 Gentleman's Agreement, by Laura Z. Hobson, a novel about a gentile journalist who goes undercover as a Jew to write about the experience of antisemitism and exclusion in New York City and the upper class suburbs of Connecticut. It was a tremendous bestseller, and was made into an Oscar-winning movie with Gregory Peck in the leading role.
Another is the 1958 Exodus, by Leon Uris, about the founding of the State of Israel following the voyage of the immigration ship "Exodus". It too was made into a highly successful film, released in 1960, starring Paul Newman in the central role. Though I was a young child in pajamas in the back of my parents' car at a drive-in theater, I still remember the impression made on me by its stirring music and vivid graphic opening.
Gordan examines other best-selling fiction by such writers as Herman Wouk, the author of Marjorie Morningstar and The Caine Mutiny, who also wrote the non-fiction This Is My God, his interpretation of Judaism (also a bestseller), and similar non-fiction texts by rabbis of the period. Wouk was a practitioner of Modern Orthodox Judaism, and the other books examined Judaism from the Reconstructionist and Reform viewpoints.
In addition, she describes the special features on Judaism (and other major religions) in mainstream magazines like Time, Life, and Look, which were revolutionary in bringing a Jewish perspective into the mainstream of American life.
On the whole, it presents a positive view of the evolution and mainstreaming of Jewish life in America after World War II, and onward, until the last decade or so, when we began to see obvious evidence of increased antisemitism once again, typified by the Tree of Life synagogue attack in Pittsburgh in 2018. It is a highly informative and fascinating book, but it was written before the October 7, 2023 attack on Israel by Hamas and the ensuing events. Since then, everything has changed, and the hopeful sentiments of this book must, sadly, be viewed as nostalgia.
March 27, 2025
Unusual book that was quite thought-provoking. Lots of detail about anti-antisemitism books in the later 1940s and 1950s that showed gentiles that Jewish people are 'just like you and me' and are normal Americans who simply follow Judaism, a mainstream religion just like Protestantism and Catholicism.
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January 9, 2025808.8 Gor
Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews