The New York Intellectuals: The First Generation

In her first lecture, Professor Wisse provides a brief overview of the first generation of the New York Intellectuals: their emergence, goals, and cultural context. In particular, she probes the work of three different Jewish writers—Moyshe-Leyb Halpern, Anzia Yezierska, and Ludwig Lewisohn—who serve as examples of how these hitherto European Jews tried to balance their Jewishness with their new identities as Americans.

Co-founder and editor of the Yiddish daily Foverts, Abraham Cahan was perhaps the greatest Jewish newspaperman of his age. In this episode, Professor Wisse will discuss how he became a pivotal figure in bridging the gap between Eastern European Jewish immigrants and American society. She also discusses the ways in which Cahan's work influenced later generations of Jewish intellectuals, and assesses his lasting impact on American Jewish culture.  

Poetry dominated early Yiddish literature in America, and Jacob Glatstein was perhaps the country's greatest Yiddish poet. In this episode, Professor Wisse examines Glatstein's foreboding, realist, but still inspirational work. Through his poetry, as well as his essays and criticism, Glatstein challenged American Jewry, lamented the commodification of Judaism, excoriated Nazism and Communism, and served as both defendant and prosecutor of God after the Holocaust.

The Yiddish writer H. Leivick spent much of his life as a dedicated socialist. But over time, he grew disillusioned by Communism and the Soviet Union, forming a deep connection to Israel and coming to appreciate America. In this episode, Professor Wisse examines Leivick's ideas through the lens of his most influential work, The Golem. This dramatic poem gives voice to Leivick's understanding of evil, chosenness, Jewish redemption, and much else.

Prior to Leonard Cohen, A.M. Klein was Canada's most famous Jewish poet. In this lecture, Professor Wisse explains how Klein's life and career in Canada can help illuminate New York's great Jewish writers. She also discusses Klein's attachment to both Canada and to Jewishness, his Zionism, and how he understood the modern intellectual challenges to Judaism.

Marie Syrkin was a passionate voice for Labor Zionism, dedicating her literary and intellectual energy to the cause of Jewish statehood. In this episode, Professor Wisse explores how Syrkin chronicled the rebirth of Zionism, criticized the Soviet Union, and shaped English-language Jewish discourse as a poet, essayist, professor, and journalist. Syrkin played a unique role as both participant in, and scribe of, a pivotal movement in Jewish history.

It was Maurice Samuel who first forged the path of the career Jewish public intellectual in America. In this lecture, Professor Wisse discusses his storied life and vast literary output. Samuel was a bracing writer with bold arguments, and one of the most persuasive advocates of the Zionist cause in American history.

Perhaps the preeminent Yiddish writer of the modern era, Isaac Bashevis Singer won the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1978. His writing was witty, vivid, ironic, and powerful. In this lecture, Professor Wisse examines Singer's work in the context of American Jewish literature. She highlights his subtle conservatism and reflects on Singer's aloofness toward his adopted country, even as America embraced him. ​

Perhaps more powerfully than any other modern writer, Chaim Grade struggled with the meaning of the Holocaust for Judaism's belief in a just God, and for the Jewish people's faith in mankind. In this final episode, Professor Wisse examines that part of Grade's work, as well as how he dramatized the best of East European pre-war Jewish civilization and rabbinic culture through novels, poems, and short stories. To her, Grade can teach American Jews much about how to confront their internal and external challenges today.