Gulag literature and the literature of Nazi camps : an intercontexual reading / Leona Toker.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Toker, Leona, author.

Series:

Jewish literature and culture

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Solzhenit︠s︡yn, Aleksandr Isaevich, 1918-2008.

Solzhenit︠s︡yn, Aleksandr Isaevich.

Solzhenit͡syn, Aleksandr Isaevich, 1918-2008.

Shalamov, Varlam.

Levi, Primo, 1919-1987.

Levi, Primo.

Wiesel, Elie, 1928-2016.

Wiesel, Elie.

Semprún, Jorge.

Ka-tzetnik 135633, 1909-2001.

Ka-tzetnik 135633.

Internment camps in literature--20th century.

Internment camps in literature.

Nazi concentration camps in literature--20th century.

Nazi concentration camps in literature.

Internment camps--Soviet Union.

Internment camps.

Holocaust, Jewish (1939-1945) in literature.

Prisoners' writings, Soviet.

Soviet Union.

Prisoners' writings, Soviet--History and criticism.

Holocaust, Jewish (1939-1945), in literature--History and criticism.

Holocaust, Jewish (1939-1945), in literature.

Nazi concentration camps.

Genre:

Criticism, interpretation, etc.

Physical Description:

xii, 281 pages ; 24 cm.

Place of Publication:

Bloomington Indiana : Indiana University Press, [2019]

Summary:

Devoted to the ways in which Holocaust literature and gulag literature provide contexts for each other, Leona Toker shows how the prominent features of one shed light on the veiled features and methods of the other. Toker views these narratives and texts against a background of historical information about the Soviet and Nazi regimes of repression. Writers at the center of this work include Varlam Shalamov, Primo Levi, Elie Wiesel, and Ka-Tzetnik, along with Alexandr Solzhenitsyn, Evgeniya Ginzburg, and Jorge Semprún, all of whom illuminate the discussion. Toker's twofold analysis concentrates on the narrative qualities of the works as well as how each text documents the writer's experience. She provides insight into how fictionalized narrative can double as historical testimony, how references to events might have become obscure owing to the passage of time and cultural diversity of readers, and how these references form new meaning in the text. Toker, well known as a skillful interpreter of gulag literature, offers new thinking about how gulag literature and Holocaust literature enable a better understanding about testimony in the face of evil.

Contents:

Acknowledgments

Intercontextuality: Introduction

The Gulag and Nazi Camps: From Improvisation to Stability

Two Strands of Concentration-Camp Literature: A Brief History of an Entanglement

The Muselmann and the Dokhodiaga

Forced Labor

The Drowned and the Reprieved

On the Way to Resistance

Faith

End Games

Survivor Guilt

Concluding Reflections

Works Cited

Index

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN:

9780253043511

0253043514

9780253043535

0253043530

OCLC:

1057781417