Jewish Life in Renaissance Italy

Bonfil, Robert

ISBN 10: 0520073509 / ISBN 13: 9780520073500

Verlag: University of California Press, 1994

In. Bestandsnummer des Verkäufers ria9780520073500_new

Inhaltsangabe:

With this heady exploration of time and space, rumors and silence, colors, tastes, and ideas, Robert Bonfil recreates the richness of Jewish life in Renaissance Italy. He also forces us to rethink conventional interpretations of the period, which feature terms like "assimilation" and "acculturation." Questioning the Italians' presumed capacity for tolerance and civility, he points out that Jews were frequently uprooted and persecuted, and where stable communities did grow up, it was because the hostility of the Christian population had somehow been overcome.

After the ghetto was imposed in Venice, Rome, and other Italian cities, Jewish settlement became more concentrated. Bonfil claims that the ghetto experience did more to intensify Jewish self-perception in early modern Europe than the supposed acculturation of the Renaissance. He shows how, paradoxically, ghetto living opened and transformed Jewish culture, hastening secularization and modernization.

Bonfil's detailed picture reveals in the Italian Jews a sensitivity and self-awareness that took into account every aspect of the larger society. His inside view of a culture flourishing under stress enables us to understand how identity is perceived through constant interplay—on whatever terms—with the Other.

Über die Autorin bzw. den Autor:

Robert Bonfil is Professor of Jewish History at The Hebrew University, Jerusalem. His extensive publications on the history of Italian Jewry in Hebrew, Italian, French, and English have earned him an international reputation. Anthony Oldcorn is Professor of Italian Studies at Brown University.

Bibliografische Details

Titel: Jewish Life in Renaissance Italy
Verlag: University of California Press
Erscheinungsdatum: 1994
Einband: Hardcover
Zustand: New