Yale Companion to Jewish Writing and Thought in German Culture, 1096-1996

This work provides a history of Jewish writing and thought in the German-speaking world. Written by 118 scholars in the field, the book is arranged chronologically, moving from the 11th century to the present. Throughout, it depicts the contribution that Jewish writers have made to German culture and at the same time explores what it means to the "other" within that mainstream culture. The contributors view German-Jewish literature as a historical and cultural phenomenon from a wide array of critical perspectives. Many essays focus on significant social and political events that affected the relationship between Germans and Jews: others concentrates on a particular genre, author, group of writers, cultural debate, or literary movement. Entries include an account of the Crusades in 1076, a treatment of Jewish mysticism in the Renaissance, a 17th-century memoir by a woman, the description of a meeting between Heinrich Heine and Karl Marx in 1843 and discussions of works by such luminaries as Sigmund Freud, Arthur Schnitzler, Joseph Roth, Martin Buber, Walter Benjamin, Elias Canetti, Hermann Broch, Hannah Arendt, Theodor Adorno and Peter Weiss.