Jewish Traces in the Inter-War Prose Writing of Assimilated Authors

Abstract

The study deals with the thematisation of Jewishness in the inter-war prose writing of four authors from assimilated Jewish families: Richard Weiner (born 1884), František Langer (born 1888), Karel Poláček (born 1892) and Egon Hostovský (born 1908). Whereas the prose of the last-named author has received considerable attention in contemporary literary history, in the case of the remaining authors their Jewishness remains on the periphery of scholarly interest, or is mentioned in works of a synthetic character. A detailed reading of the work of all three prose writers reveals that for them Jewish culture did not represent an essential literary theme, and indeed they barely mentioned it whatsoever. An exception relates to the abundant references to anti-Semitism in Karel Poláček’s cycle of novels about the provincial town, which can be explained among other factors by the aggravated political situation in the second half of the 1930s.

Keywords

• czech literature
• czech fiction of the first half of the 20th century
• jewish origin
• assimilation
• artistic depiction of judaism