THE SOVIET JEWISH BOOKSHELF: JEWISH CULTURE AND IDENTITY BETWEEN THE LINES by Marat Grinberg

The book’s main argument is that in an environment where Judaism had been all but destroyed, and a public Jewish presence routinely delegitimized, reading uniquely provided for many Soviet Jews an entry to communal memory and identity. The bookshelf was both a depository of selective Jewish knowledge and often the only conspicuously Jewish presence in their homes. The typical Soviet Jewish “bookshelf” consisted of a few translated works from Hebrew and numerous translations from Yiddish and German as well as Russian books with both noticeable and subterranean Jewish content. Such volumes, officially published, and not intended solely for a Jewish audience, afforded an opportunity for Soviet Jews to indulge insubordinate feelings in a largely safe manner. Unlike the earlier or more recent investigations of Jewishness in Soviet literary contexts, which identified “Jewish Themes” in and “Jewish Contributions” to Soviet literature on a biographical basis, this project is concerned with pinpointing or even decoding the complex reading strategies and the specifically Jewish uses to which the books on the Soviet Jewish bookshelf were put, which means that not only Jews read them, but only Jews read them in a specific way.

"Superbly researched and lucidly argued, The Soviet Jewish Bookshelf makes a convincing case for the formation of a unique Soviet Jewish identity through subversive and generative reading practices... Grinberg’s book bears witness to a community’s heroic struggle to survive against impossible odds."

Helena I. Gurfinkel, Southern Illinois University Edwardsville