Oedipus' Sister: Narrating Gender and Nation in the Early Novels of Israeli Women by Hadar Makov-Hasson A dissertation submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy Department of Hebrew and Judaic Studies New York University September, 2009 ___________________________ Yael S. Feldman UMI Number: 3380280 All rights reserved INFORMATION TO ALL USERS The quality of this reproduction is dependent upon the quality of the copy submitted. In the unlikely event that the author did not send a complete manuscript and there are missing pages, these will be noted. Also, if material had to be removed, a note will indicate the deletion. UMI 3380280 Copyright 2009 by ProQuest LLC. All rights reserved. This edition of the work is protected against unauthorized copying under Title 17, United States Code. ProQuest LLC 789 East Eisenhower Parkway P.O. Box 1346 Ann Arbor, MI 48106-1346 © Hadar Makov-Hasson All Rights Reserved, 2009 DEDICATION בדמי ימיה מתה אמי , וכבת ששים שש שנה הייתה במותה This dissertation is dedicated to the memory of my mother Nira Makov. Her love, intellectual curiosity, and courage are engraved on my heart forever. iii ACKNOWLEDGMENTS This dissertation would have never been written without the help and support of several people to whom I am extremely grateful. First and foremost, I would like to express my deepest gratitude to my advisor, Professor Yael Feldman, whose pioneering work on the foremothers of Hebrew literature inspired me to pursue the questions that this dissertation explores. Professor Feldman‘s insights illuminated the subject of Israeli women writers for me; her guidance and advice have left an indelible imprint on my thinking, and on this dissertation. Most of all, Professor Feldman‘s passion, combined with her tremendous drive and determination, have inspired me to persevere with this project when the going got rough, and I am truly indebted to her for reaching this academic goal. I would also like to thank the members of my committee. Professor David Engel‘s inspiring classes on modern Jewish thought helped me to think in new ways about the history of modern Hebrew literature and the intellectual debates that shaped it. I was similarly inspired and challenged by the work of Professor Alan Mintz, whose portrayal of the talush figure has informed several sections of this dissertation .I am very grateful to both of them for their kind words and encouragement, especially in the final phases of the writing process. My sincere thanks are also extended to my readers: Professor Ana Maria Dopico, whose thoughtful feedback on the essays I wrote under her direction for my Minor Exam has had a major theoretical impact on this dissertation. I also owe special thanks to Professor Anne Golomb Hoffman and iv Professor Zafrira Lidovsky-Cohen for agreeing to serve as readers of this dissertation and for the interest they have shown in my work. I would like to express my gratitude for the tremendous assistance I received from the department of Hebrew and Judaic studies at NYU, and I would especially like to thank Shayne Leslie Figueroa for her limitless patience and her extraordinary efforts in helping me resolve administrative issues while I was living overseas. I also gratefully acknowledge the generous financial support that I have received from the Henrey M. MacCracken Fund. Last, but certainly not least, I would like to thank my wonderful family: my father and brothers for their love and support through this long, sometimes arduous process, and my husband Coby whose boundless positive energy, enthusiasm, and belief in me as an academic writer have served as my daily fuel in completing the dissertation. I would also like to send a special thanks to my two daughters, Einav and Netta. Raising two girls has certainly brought new—and very personal—meaning to the notion of female lineage which resonates throughout this dissertation; I hope this work will make them proud. v ABSTRACT This dissertation follows the emergence of the first novels to be written by women in Israel after 1948. Largely ignored until now, the corpus of the female interwar novelists [1948-1966] consists of more than twenty novels which offer a diverse and innovative engagement with questions of gender and nation. The dissertation presents a reading of six such novels, framed within a discussion of the writers‘ choice of genre, a highly uncommon venue for women writers during that time. The main argument of this dissertation is that women novelists of the suggested period proposed alternative interpretations to the prevailing Zionist meta- narrative which dominated Hebrew male-centered literature. By employing strategies of appropriation and subversion, these writers have managed to portray alternative protagonists with different trajectories The six novels analyzed in the dissertation are closely read through the lenses of various theories. First, theories of the novel are explored in an examination of the chosen genre and the unique possibilities of resistance it offers. Next, the novels are read in conjunction with feminist and postcolonial theories as a means to highlight their moments of interruption of the national narrative, and as a tool to recognize and explain strategies of resistance and defiance. vi My reading reveals that while often adopting canonized poetics, the female interwar novelists use this form of appropriation as a cover up for their subversive content. Offering marginal protagonists, both women and men, they reread the national narrative by either foregrounding feminine and artistic coming-of-age stories that defy stereotypical gender roles, or by exposing the ruptures within the model of national manhood through the exploration of male protagonists and their nationalized masculinity. This dissertation presents a two-fold contribution to the field of modern Hebrew literature. First, it adds a ―missing link‖ to the story of women‘s writing, exposing a continuity that contradicts previous depictions of this writing as sporadic and mostly marginal. Second, it rattles prevalent perceptions of the literary canon, revealing how its so-called margins managed to infiltrate and undermine the ruling literary norms of the time, while anticipating some of Israel‘s most prominent literary works. vii TABLE OF CONTENTS Dedication ...................................................................................................................... iii Acknowledgments ......................................................................................................... iv Abstract .......................................................................................................................... vi Introduction: Demarcating The Female ―Interwar‖ Novelists [1948-1966] .................. 1 The Anxiety of Survival ......................................................................................... 5 On Gender and Nation in Israel: The Case of Literature ........................................ 8 Adding the Missing Link ...................................................................................... 14 Chapter Overview ................................................................................................. 15 Chapter 1: Writing the Novel: Gender, Nation and Canonicity ................................... 18 The Genre of the Novel ........................................................................................ 19 Gender and Genre: the Novel from a Feminist Perspective ................................. 26 National Identity and the Novel ........................................................................... 33 A Short History of the Israeli Novel ..................................................................... 39 A (very) Short History of Hebrew Women Novelists .......................................... 44 Chapter 2: Gender and Genre: Writing the Female Bildungsroman in Naomi Fraenkel‘s Trilogy Shaul and Yohannah ...................................................................... 56 Reading Germany in Israel ................................................................................... 59 The Bildungsroman .............................................................................................. 64 Gender and Family, the Patriarchal Home: First Volume ...................................... 69 Angel or Warrior? Feminine Role-Models in the Trilogy .................................... 72 Jewish Manhood: A Dead-end ............................................................................. 78 The Butterfly Awakens: Second Volume ................................................................... 82 Pygmalion‘s Curse: Erasing Identity .................................................................... 86 Testing Ideologies: Gender, Violence and Withdrawal ....................................... 89 Bidding Goodbyes, the Beginning of the Journey: Third Volume ............................ 93 Killing the Jew Within .......................................................................................... 94 Resurrection: Retracing the Maternal Lineage ..................................................... 96 Womanhood Resisted ........................................................................................... 99 The Collapse of Patriarchy ................................................................................. 102 “It‟s So Wonderful to Run Toward a Secret” ........................................................ 103 Chapter 3: The