Bernard Malamud's Works in Light of Current Events - ALA, 24-27 May, 2012

full name / name of organization: 
Brian Adler/Bernard Malamud Society
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An examination of any of Bernard Malamud's works through the lens of contemporary events as they pertain to Israel. How is the voice of the Palestinian given space within Malamud's works? Does Malamud's writings speak to the turbulent nature of the Middle East as we currently see it in any way?

The New York Review of Books recently published for the first time a talk that Saul Bellow gave in 1988, in which Bellow says, "Israel is to a considerable degree obliged to share the malaise we all suffer—the French, the Italians, the Germans, the British, the Americans, and the Russians. Israel is narrowly watched by the West, and the Western press and public try hard to find evidences of Jewish evil and perhaps its aim is to implicate the Jews in its nihilism."

How political is Malamud? How concerned with nihilism is he? Papers of fifteen to twenty minutes reading time are invited on these or related topics.

Please send 250 word abstracts and a short CV to Brian Adler, Ph.D., English Department, Georgia Southwestern State University, by January 15, 2012. Submit to: badler@gsw.edu