In this provocative new essay, the novelist Howard Jacobson asks whether Jews will ever be forgiven the Holocaust. Experience teaches that the burden of guilt is as difficult for people to bear as the burden of obligation. Philosophers and novelists alike note that irritation with this burden can quickly turn to resentment. So should Jews therefore be especially careful not to present themselves as victims, and not to express fears that the Holocaust might happen again?
Does the same law apply to anti-Semitism? Does it, too, perpetuate itself the moment it is pointed out and contested? Anti-Zionists argue that their argument is not with Jews themselves, but they often claim their own immunity from criticism, as though hatred of Israel gives automatic exemption from the charge of anti-Semitism. Today ways would seem to be proliferating in which anti-Semitism can be simultaneously expressed and denied. Howard Jacobson wonders if this chain of animosity can ever be broken.An award-winning writer and broadcaster, Howard Jacobson was born in Manchester, brought up in Prestwich and was educated at Stand Grammar School in Whitefield, and Downing College, Cambridge, where he studied under F. R. Leavis. He lectured for three years at the University of Sydney before returning to teach at Selwyn College, Cambridge. His novels include The Mighty Walzer (winner of the Bollinger Everyman Wodehouse Prize), Kalooki Nights (longlisted for the Man Booker Prize), the highly acclaimed The Act of Love and, most recently, the Man Booker Prize 2010-winning The Finkler Question. Howard Jacobson lives in London.
