Postmodernism Doesn’t Equal Post-Zionism: Hanokh Bartov and the Advent of Israeli Postmodernist Fiction
In this lecture, Professor Hollander contests the scholarly view that Israeli postmodernist fiction emerged alongside post-Zionism, an intellectual movement that challenges major tenets of Israeli nationalism, in the 1980s and 1990s, and both reflects and contributes to the breakdown of Israeli society. Through analysis of Hanokh Bartov’s 1962 short story “Around the Ring Incident,” he demonstrates Israeli postmodernist fiction’s development decades before post-Zionism’s rise and point to the story as an example of constructive social criticism at home within Israeli national culture.
About the presenter:
Philip Hollander is an assistant professor of Israeli Literature and Culture at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. He is the author of the forthcoming book From Schlemiel to Sabra: Masculinity and Palestinian Hebrew Literature.
