No Joke: Making Jewish Humor
Table of Contents
List of Illustrations
Introduction: The Best Medicine
1. German Lebensraum
2. Yiddish Heartland
3. The Anglosphere
4. Under Hitler and Stalin
5. Hebrew Homeland
Conclusion: When Can I Stop Laughing?
Acknowledgments
Notes
Index
Suggested Reading
Drowning in the Red Sea
Gennady Estraikh said, "It is hardly an overstatement to define Yiddish literature of the 1920s as the most pro-Soviet literature in the world." When Arab riots killed 400 Jews in Palestine in late August 1929, the Yiddish communist press found itself torn between sympathy for the fallen and loyalty to the Revolution.
The Wizard of Words and the Baggy Monster: Rereading Amos Oz’s A Tale of Love and Darkness
Israelis made Amos Oz a cultural symbol—almost a fetish—of who they thought they were or fancied themselves to be. But their adoration wasn't unconditional. Oz's editor, literary scholar Yigal Schwartz, called Israel’s unbalanced relationship with Oz a “bipolar reading disorder."
Yo’s Blues
For Israeli artist Yoram Kaniuk, the bohemian world of Billie Holiday, Marlon Brando, and James Agee had a lot to offer, but not enough.
Misreading Kafka
The Kafka myths, and the "myth-busters" who make them.
