Gradually receiving legal rights from the 18th century onwards, Jews in Germany and Austria adapted to their surrounding culture with success but also with increasing strain as anti-Semitism gathered pace. This title investigates how tensions were articulated in literary works, by both Jews and Gentile authors, from the Enlightenment to the 1930s.

Introduction ; Enlightenment; German Jewry before Emancipation; How the Enlightenment saw the Jews; Lessing and Toleration; Emancipation: Dohm versus Humboldt; Moses Mendelssohn and the Rational Jew; Mendelssohns Legacy ; Liberalism; Jews and Liberalism in the Nineteenth Century; Schnitzler: Liberalism and Irony; The European Humanism of Stefan Zweig; Freud: Science versus Religion ; Antisemitism; Varieties of Antisemitism; Literary Images of the Jew ; Assimilation; The Meaning of Assimilation; Self-Hatred; Hyperacculturation ; Dissimilation; The Jewish Renaissance; The Eastern Jews; The Jew as Oriental ; Zionism ; Abbreviations ; Select Bibliography

... engaging reading of the Enlightenment ... as a study of representations of Jewish identities, Robertson's work offers a well-versed survey and provides a comprehensive view of the topic that leaves only the field of postwar German-Jewish literature untouched.

`Robertson aims to give a broad synthesis of nearly two centuries of literary history, and it is difficult to imagine a book that does it better' Modern Language Quarterly, Vol.62, No.1 `Well versed in contemporary research on the history of German Jewry, Robertson offers literary critics an easily digestible introduction to this field. His primary goal, and what he does best, is to place literary expressions of the Jewish question in historical context' Modern Language Quarterly, Vol.62, No.1 `Eminently readable and accessible, this study is destined to become the standard survey of the topic' Modern Language Quarterly, Vol.62, No.1 `Robertson's book presents a breathtaking synthesis of literary expressions of the "Jewish question" in the German-speaking world, neatly positioning them alongside political, theological, philosophical, racial, and medical discourses from the period. The book's great strength is that it avoids teleological views of German history as a prelude to the Holocaust' Modern Language Quarterly, Vol.62, No.1 This magisterial survey, ranging over almost two hundred years, should be read by all those interested in the Jewish question in German literature and indeed in the German-speaking territories themselves. ... he tackles such potentially painful topics as Jewish self-hatred; and he does so calmly, judiciously and with a wealth of evidence. `Robertson does an admirable job in identifying and analyzing the complex development of 'the Jewish Question.'' Mitchell B. Hart, Religious Studies Rev. Vol.26, No.4, Oct. 00. `This book will be valuable to beginning and advanced students and specialists of modern Jewish and modern German history and literature.' Mitchell B. Hart, Religious Studies Rev. Vol.26, No.4, Oct. 00. `It can be mined for its extensive translations and summaries and engaged with as a masterful synthesis and interpretation of the major themes and dilemmas of modern Jewish and European history.' Mitchell B. Hart, Religious Studies Rev. Vol.26, No.4, Oct. 00. `the reader will appreciate Robertson's fresh insights and his ability to synthesize and elucidate a vast body of primary and secondary sources.' I. Di Maio, Choice, June 2000. `a whole series of stories, richly heterogenous in nature ... his account of Mendelssohn's career, and of his family's history, is admirably fair and illuminating. Robertson's is a magisterial work. He has read everything, and summarises it well' Anthony Julius, The Times, 29/07/99 `Robertson's tireless labour ... Robertson's scholarly work deserves a place in every university library.' Edward Timms, THES

A stimulating and thoughtful approach to the Jewish Question in modern Germany and Austria An erudite examination of the literary texts which shaped Jewish identities before the Holocaust No other study by a single author deals with German-Jewish relations so comprehensively and over such a long period of literary history

A stimulating and thoughtful approach to the Jewish Question in modern Germany and Austria An erudite examination of the literary texts which shaped Jewish identities before the Holocaust No other study by a single author deals with German-Jewish relations so comprehensively and over such a long period of literary history