Next Year in Jerusalem - Gabrielle Harbowy

[jimhines]

One of the side effects of these guest blogs is that I’m constantly thinking, “Ooh, I want to read that!” as people mention stories and books in the essays and comments. I’m going to try to put together a reading list based on the conversations around each essay, though it may take me a few weeks to pull that together after all of these have been

Comments

[rhoda_rants]

Thanks for sharing this. I grew up with a Jewish best friend, and never really thought about the Santa Claus thing. She never spoiled the magic for me, but it occurs to me now that even though I knew what a Menorah was and got invited to her house for Passover, the idea that Santa wasn't part of her family's tradition didn't even cross my mind as a kid. It's so easy to take stuff for granted when your assumptions aren't challenged, which is why these guest posts are so, so important.

And wow, that Vampires + Passover story sounds amazing!

[la_marquise_de_]

I've always loved Susan Schwartz, Grail of Hearts, because it took both the Grail and the Last Supper out of the Christian context that was always enforced on them in most fiction.

[dichroic]

That definitely matches my experience growing up. There was even a friend in third grade who asked me to watch for Santa for her. She'd been told that if she saw him, he wouldn't give her any presents. But I wasn't getting presents from Santa anyway, so no risk for me.

Plug for a friend's stuff (I hope that's OK): Shira Glassman's Mangoverse now contains three YA books. They are second-world fantasy novels - but it's a *Jewish* world, in which characters light Shabbat candles and celebrate Seders. There are also lesbians, mangos, dragons, labor disputes, wizards, food allergies, and assorted other aspects of real and fantasy life contained therein.

[green_knight]

I don't know whether it's OK or not, but they're books that totally would never have been on my radar; I just bought the first one.

(Also, I don't think anyone has mentioned Bogi Takács yet; and yes, reading a universe that's fundamentally Jewish shows just how narrow-minded a lot of SFF is.)

[elialshadowpine]

OK, those look awesome. Bought! :D

[harvey_rrit]

That's disquieting. No, it's saddening.

I read that, hoping (ever more faintly) that it might be some kind of overreaction, such as so many, many people have. It isn't. The delivery of these observations is infused with the grayness of mundane reality, and any writer who could produce the real thing (not just the patina that impressed so many of my teachers in school) would never waste it on fiction: a writer who could do that could make a reader accept a time-traveling dragon. And would rather.

[gehayi]

There's Veronica Schanoes. You can read two of her stories on Tor.com's website--"Among the Thorns" and "Burning Girls." "Among the Thorns" is a retelling of one of the Grimms' more anti-Semitic fairy tales. "Burning Girls"--just read it. It involves lilits and demons and magic and America. Both are very solidly grounded in Jewish history.

But aside from Schanoes...no, I can't think of many Jewish characters in fantasy.

Fortunately, the internet helped me out here.

Jewish Science Fiction and Fantasy

[liam_amiel]

I didn't come from a Jewish background at all (that's putting it mildly--I didn't even know I was Jewish until a couple of years ago), so most of this I only noticed recently, but I have to agree.

The one thing that struck me as a bit odd is this:

If someone like me is in a story, I want it to have purpose and expose a culture, a worldview, an experience, to people who aren’t familiar with it.

This to me says that she thinks that if a character is going to be a member of a minority, there has to be a reason for them to be that minority. That's something that anti-diversity people say, with the "logical" conclusion being that if there isn't a plot-related reason for them to be a member of a minority, they should just be a cishet non-disabled, neurotypical, white Christian (and so on) man. I'm pretty sure that isn't what she's saying, so I find this perplexing.

[gehayi]

This to me says that she thinks that if a character is going to be a member of a minority, there has to be a reason for them to be that minority. That's something that anti-diversity people say, with the "logical" conclusion being that if there isn't a plot-related reason for them to be a member of a minority, they should just be a cishet non-disabled, neurotypical, white Christian (and so on) man. I'm pretty sure that isn't what she's saying, so I find this perplexing.

I found that odd, too.

[rosefox]

It may come as a shock to you that not all marginalized people feel the same way about depictions of marginalized people. If only there were... I don't know, some sort of set of essays by marginalized people who could talk about their different perspectives. Maybe on a website that a lot of people read? That might help increase the perception of marginalized people as individuals with individual opinions. I should think about who I know who might host something like that on their website.