109-453 Literature of Destruction

Admission to the postgraduate diploma or fourth year combined honours in Jewish studies.

This subject involves the advanced study of Jewish literary texts, classical, medieval and modern, with special concern for the theme of destruction and literary representations of and responses to catastrophe. Attention is also given to major topics in the critical tradition of reading Jewish texts. Contemporary Holocaust literature forms a substantial component of the subject, including the work of writers such as Primo Levy, Elie Wiesel, David Grossman. Students should complete the subject with a deeper and more extensive understanding of the character of Jewish literature through the ages; and have developed critical skills in its analysis and interpretation.