Kramer and Wirth-Nesher’s collection comprises fifteen separate essays addressing different aspects and themes in Jewish American literature.  The chapters include explorations of the origins of Jewish American literary history; Eastern European immigrant contribution; Hebrew and multi-lingual writing; poetry; the impact of the Holocaust; and contemporary literary theory, and writing.  The chapters run in chronological order, although there is, of course, some overlap.

Helpfully, the collection begins with informative and clear essays from Michael P. Kramer and Susannah Heschel, which serve to set up later chapters, offering background analyses of the Old World and the importance of America as a promised land in Jewish thought.  Of particular merit is the essay by Priscilla Wald, which reassesses canonical texts of the pre-war years, evaluating the recent immigrants’ endorsements or censures of their new homeland; her conclusions are surprising and well argued.  Less successful is Susan Gubar’s consideration of Jewish American women’s writing, which lacks a framework, leaving the reader slightly confused.  While the individual essays vary enormously in focus, as a whole, the collection is an in depth investigation into the importance of identity in Jewish American literature, and the impact of language and conceptions of home.

The clearly stated purpose of this collection is to show the variety encompassed by the term Jewish American literature: to reconsider well-known themes and authors and to suggest those that require further attention in the future.  It attempts to tell the full and complex story of Jewish experience in America, not just the simplistic journey from ‘trouble to triumph’ that is normally propagated.  The collection certainly covers a wide range of time periods and movements; however, the essays are predominantly leftist or liberal in tone and promote secular Jewish output over the alternatives; there is little interest in Orthodox Judaism as an influence, apart from to expose its irrelevance. 

The desire behind this collection was to present a more nuanced account of Jewish American literature, and while this is a worthy aim, it does put the reader under some pressure.  It would be helpful for the reader to have some knowledge of the accounts this collection wishes to right.  This collection is certainly to be recommended as further reading within the field, but it would perhaps be a difficult introduction or overview for the uninitiated.  However, for those already well read in such critical material, it is an engaging read.