Review
An informative, intelligent text that is a pleasure to read. SOUTH ATLANTIC REVIEW"Important contribution to the rather underdeveloped field of German postcolonial studies." INTERNATIONAL REVIEW OF MODERNISM
Product Description
This pioneering volume is the first to examine the phenomenon of Jewish-German orientalist literature. For many Jewish-German authors of the twentieth-century, the Orient represented an imaginative space where they could analyse their position as Jews in German society, and come to terms with a divided identity. Here, representations of Muslims and Islamicate cultures in the works of popular and respected authors who were nevertheless often seen as Jewish, Oriental 'others' by the German-speaking societies in which they lived are explored. Lasker-Schuler's Die Nachte Tino von Bagdads (1907) and Der Prinz von Theben (1912) create a timeless Orient filled with visionary artists like herself, while Wolf's Mohammed: Ein Oratorium (1922) depicts the Orient as the birthplace of the message of justice espoused by Islam: through it Wolf reaches a new understanding of his position as a progressive Jew in a war-torn German society. In Werfel's Die vierzig Tage des Musa Dagh (1933), the author uses the conflict between Turks and Armenians to explore his own religiosity.
