Welcome and Introduction

What is this blog about

I still remember the first time I read People Love Dead Jews by Dara Horn – mostly because I remember my reaction to it. There were multiple parts of that book that have stayed with me – but this is one quote I return to frequently.

“We expect the good guys to be ‘saved.’ If that doesn’t happen, we at least expect the main character to have an ‘epiphany.’ And if that doesn’t happen, then at least the author ought to give us a ‘moment of grace.’ All three are Christian terms. So many of our expectations of literature are based on Christianity – and not just Christianity, but the precise points at which Christianity and Judaism diverge. And then I noticed something else: the canonical works by authors in Jewish languages almost never give their readers any of those things.” – page 75

In other words – the way we structure and teach literature is Christian. Our writing craft is Christian.

Craft in the Real World by Matthew Salesses is, as its subtitle indicates, about rethinking fiction writing and workshopping, specifically with the acknowledgement that writing craft is not neutral.  Salesses makes this clear from the preface stating:

“What we call craft is in fact nothing more or less than a set of expectations. Those expectations are shaped by workshop, by reading, by awards and gatekeepers, by biases about whose stories matter and how they should be told. …The more we know about the context of those expectations, the more consciously we can engage with them. These expectations are never neutral. They represent the values of the culturally dominant population…”

Craft in the Real World provides purposed redefinitions of common craft terms and examples of how traditional understanding of writing craft in the American context ignores realities for Asian American writers. For example, Salesses discusses how traditional Chinese storytelling differs from the Western model and proposes different views of craft for Asian American writers – such as prioritizing telling over showing, adopting a different traditional plot structure, and more.

Writing craft is part of a cultural construct – and adopting the culturally dominant writing craft is another small way in which minorities assimilate. Naming the ways in which a group may have different expectations for their stories is one way, maybe small, to be distinct and reinforce a group’s different values, histories, and stories about themselves.

In the book People Love Dead Jews, Dara Horn uses the opportunity to discuss some specific examples from various works of literature and the chapter, as well as the book as a whole, is well worth the read – but the part that I keep coming back to (and that is less the focus of the chapter itself) is what I thought would be the next obvious question – “Ok – so what would it look like to write a novel and structure it in a way that’s Jewish?” What does Jewish Writing Craft look like?

I will acknowledge that there is a question about how practical this information might be for writing a book intended to be sold on the market. I have the benefit of not being an author trying to market a book for sale. I am not looking for an agent. I don’t really care what the market thinks. And so, I have the freedom to wonder and explore and ask the question – if I were to try to attempt to find a Jewish style of storytelling, in the English language, what would it look like? I am also not an academic. This is me in my armchair making some observations and see what comes together. So where would we start?

For those of us who are not academics, I return to another quote or two from People Love Dead Jews.

“Stories with definitive endings don’t necessarily reflect a belief that the world makes sense, but they do reflect a belief in the power of art to make sense of it. What one finds in Jewish storytelling, though, is something really different: a kind of realism that comes from humility, from the knowledge that one cannot be true to the human experience while pretending to make sense of the world. These are stories without conclusions, but full of endurance and resilience. They are about human limitations, which means that the stories are not endings but beginnings.” – page 79

The story that is the most Jewish story most of us will identify and agree upon are the books of the Torah – as those are the stories that have been read out loud to the Jewish community every week for at least a few hundred years – if not longer. And those stories – are stories of beginnings – origin stories. Genesis is the origin story of the world and the origin story of humanity and the origin story that is the family of the Jews. Exodus is the origin story of the peoplehood and nation of Israel. And the Torah itself “ends with a cliffhanger, stopping just before the Israelites’ long-awaited arrival in the Promised Land. The characters never even made it home.” (People Love Dead Jews, page 74).  The story of the Torah – the story that most Jews are most familiar with – is the story of the start of a nation because it is an origin story for that nation who is currently living out the sequel.

And so completely anecdotally – I am going to propose we start with the following:  maybe Jewish stories are about identifying and working towards an ultimate fulfillment – a promised land if you will – but not about achieving it or actually getting there. Maybe Jewish stories end before that promise and happy ending but are about the endurance and resilience of working towards it anyway. Maybe Jewish stories are about learning to accept the burden that comes with living in the actual world, accepting the responsibilities and requirements that come with it. Or maybe Jewish stories are something else entirely.

As I said – I am not an academic. I do not actually have the answers – but this is where I am starting.  There are more questions. What would the specifics and general shape of such a story look like? Are there any required tropes or expected themes? How would a writer sit down and intentionally craft a story that is from the beginning Jewish- reflecting Jewish worldviews and perspectives?

And well – that is what I am here to find out. Welcome to the blog.

This will mostly be me talking out loud to myself on the Internet. I am not sure where it will go or if it will go anywhere. I already have a few ideas for where to start. But it will be me figuring this out as I go. And if anyone else is interested, or has ideas, or maybe even thinks they have the solution already, feel free to pitch in. This is the conversation I want to have. It would be embarrassing if it ended up being just me talking to myself on a street corner. But I’ll do it if I have to.