Imaginary Jews and True Confessions: Ethnicity, Lyricism, and John Berryman's <em>Dream Songs</em>
<p>Berryman was fascinated with the figure of "the imaginary Jew." The phrase is the title of his first short story, it recurs in <em>The Dream Songs</em>, and it was to have been the topic of the final chapter of his autobiographical novel <...
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| Format: | Article |
| Language: | English |
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eScholarship Publishing, University of California
2009-02-01
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| Series: | Journal of Transnational American Studies |
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| Online Access: | https://submit.escholarship.org/ojs/index.php/acgcc_jtas/article/view/6942 |
| _version_ | 1819012050786975744 |
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| author | Andrew S. Gross |
| author_facet | Andrew S. Gross |
| author_sort | Andrew S. Gross |
| collection | DOAJ |
| description | <p>Berryman was fascinated with the figure of "the imaginary Jew." The phrase is the title of his first short story, it recurs in <em>The Dream Songs</em>, and it was to have been the topic of the final chapter of his autobiographical novel <em>Recovery</em>. Critics have not treated Berryman's "imaginary Jew" kindly. Early critics saw prosopopoeia as uncongenial to the confessional project. More recent critics see the figure as a misappropriation of Jewish identity. Berryman, however, did not want to pass himself off as Jewish; he invented the figure to expose the anti-Semitism of Eliot and Pound. His strategy of impersonating the stereotypical figure of "the Jew" was also in keeping with contemporary theories of prejudice and identity, which followed Sartre and psychoanalysis in understanding Jewishness as a product of morbid projection. My essay traces the critical reception—and rejection—of Berryman in order to expose what I see as the "identitarian" bias of American studies since the 1970s, most recently evident in debates over "the Americanization of the Holocaust." Berryman's transpersonal poetry, I argue, is also transnational, both in its personification of Nazi victims and in its comparison of domestic racism and the Vietnam War to genocide. Berryman's concern is not identity but the violence implicit in designating the other as Other. This violence not only plays a role in prejudice but also in progressive theories of "ethnic lyricism" that see the individual as an expression of her "culture" or "nation" and the poem as a personification of the individual.</p> |
| first_indexed | 2024-12-21T01:37:54Z |
| format | Article |
| id | doaj.art-df80d30f675648228b7b159a404f155d |
| institution | Directory Open Access Journal |
| issn | 1940-0764 |
| language | English |
| last_indexed | 2024-12-21T01:37:54Z |
| publishDate | 2009-02-01 |
| publisher | eScholarship Publishing, University of California |
| record_format | Article |
| series | Journal of Transnational American Studies |
| spelling | doaj.art-df80d30f675648228b7b159a404f155d2022-12-21T19:20:14ZengeScholarship Publishing, University of CaliforniaJournal of Transnational American Studies1940-07642009-02-0111Imaginary Jews and True Confessions: Ethnicity, Lyricism, and John Berryman's <em>Dream Songs</em>Andrew S. Gross<p>Berryman was fascinated with the figure of "the imaginary Jew." The phrase is the title of his first short story, it recurs in <em>The Dream Songs</em>, and it was to have been the topic of the final chapter of his autobiographical novel <em>Recovery</em>. Critics have not treated Berryman's "imaginary Jew" kindly. Early critics saw prosopopoeia as uncongenial to the confessional project. More recent critics see the figure as a misappropriation of Jewish identity. Berryman, however, did not want to pass himself off as Jewish; he invented the figure to expose the anti-Semitism of Eliot and Pound. His strategy of impersonating the stereotypical figure of "the Jew" was also in keeping with contemporary theories of prejudice and identity, which followed Sartre and psychoanalysis in understanding Jewishness as a product of morbid projection. My essay traces the critical reception—and rejection—of Berryman in order to expose what I see as the "identitarian" bias of American studies since the 1970s, most recently evident in debates over "the Americanization of the Holocaust." Berryman's transpersonal poetry, I argue, is also transnational, both in its personification of Nazi victims and in its comparison of domestic racism and the Vietnam War to genocide. Berryman's concern is not identity but the violence implicit in designating the other as Other. This violence not only plays a role in prejudice but also in progressive theories of "ethnic lyricism" that see the individual as an expression of her "culture" or "nation" and the poem as a personification of the individual.</p>https://submit.escholarship.org/ojs/index.php/acgcc_jtas/article/view/6942John Berryman (1914-1972)The Dream Songs (1969)"The Imaginary Jew"poetryethnicityVietnam War |
| spellingShingle | Andrew S. Gross Imaginary Jews and True Confessions: Ethnicity, Lyricism, and John Berryman's <em>Dream Songs</em> Journal of Transnational American Studies John Berryman (1914-1972) The Dream Songs (1969) "The Imaginary Jew" poetry ethnicity Vietnam War |
| title | Imaginary Jews and True Confessions: Ethnicity, Lyricism, and John Berryman's <em>Dream Songs</em> |
| title_full | Imaginary Jews and True Confessions: Ethnicity, Lyricism, and John Berryman's <em>Dream Songs</em> |
| title_fullStr | Imaginary Jews and True Confessions: Ethnicity, Lyricism, and John Berryman's <em>Dream Songs</em> |
| title_full_unstemmed | Imaginary Jews and True Confessions: Ethnicity, Lyricism, and John Berryman's <em>Dream Songs</em> |
| title_short | Imaginary Jews and True Confessions: Ethnicity, Lyricism, and John Berryman's <em>Dream Songs</em> |
| title_sort | imaginary jews and true confessions ethnicity lyricism and john berryman s lt em gt dream songs lt em gt |
| topic | John Berryman (1914-1972) The Dream Songs (1969) "The Imaginary Jew" poetry ethnicity Vietnam War |
| url | https://submit.escholarship.org/ojs/index.php/acgcc_jtas/article/view/6942 |
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