Franz Kafka: A Question of Jewish Identity. Two Perspectives (review)

The Jewish Quarterly Review, XCIII, Nos. 3-4 (January-April, 2003) 619-622 Sara Loeb. Franz Kafka: A Question ofJewish Identity. Two Perspectives. Translated by Sondra Silverston and Chaya Naor. Lanham, MD: University Press of America, 2001. Pp. xiv + 273. Loeb's focus here is an important and necessary one. Placing into comparison "two interpretive approaches that emphasize the Jewish element of [Kafka's] writings," namely, Max Brod's "religious, metaphysical approach" and Marthe Robert's "psychoanalytic structuralist approach" (p. xi), Loeb analyzes two core readings that locate Kafka's oeuvre within a Jewish framework. Both of these perspectives, Loeb argues, are crucial for an understanding of Kafka as a primarily Jewish writer, an understanding that, she laments, too few critics and schools of criticism that have adopted Kafka's project for their own purposes have recognized. Using the interconnectedness of these two approaches as the basis for her inquiry, Loeb argues that Kafka's work is embedded in a space of ceaseless opposition and struggle. His life itself is emblematic of this struggle, "marked by the incessant movement of contrasts and opposites that created a dialectic of constant strife within his consciousness" (p. 26). Importantly, Loeb traces this dialectical strategy to rabbinic tradition, connecting it specifically with "what Rabbi Nachman of Breslav called 'by way of the question,' and even when it is paradoxical in style, it expresses 'the ardor of thought that intrudes into every nook and corner . . . whether as a protest or as a longing' " (p. 26). Paradox is, thus, fundamental to Kafka's expression of Jewish identity. To her credit, Loeb refuses to collapse the contradiction and paradox that she locates at the center of Kafka's work. Rather, she grants legitimacy to two interpretive approaches, one deeply embedded in the vision of Kafka as a sacred poet, one concerned ultimately with the effects of internalizing a landscape that is stratified socially, politically, culturally, and, perhaps most importantly, linguistically. Kafka's project, then, is directed by the logic of the "both . . . and," or, as Loeb suggests, the "yes, but" (p. 131), a logic that allows for and embraces opposing forces—immanence and transcendence, agnosticism and belief, apoliticism and Zionism. I sympathize with Loeb's attempts to reclaim (or perhaps claim anew) Kafka as a Jewish writer—indeed, this is fertile and rich ground for an analysis of Kafka's project. At the same time, the originality of such an impulse is questionable. Loeb is by no means the first scholar to have followed such an impulse, and her own introduction attests to the score of scholars who have done just this; in addition to Brod and Robert, she briefly mentions Gershom Scholem, Walter Benjamin, Baruch Kurzweil, and Felix Weltsch. She does not mention other voices that have made invaluable contributions to this conversation, for instance, Robert Alter, Ritchie Robertson , Erich Grözinger, Walter Sokel, George Steiner, and Stanley Corngold. 620THE JEWISH QUARTERLY REVIEW One wonders why she has neglected such a large body of scholarship. Her discussion throughout, ostensibly directed to the question that she poses in the beginning of the book—"Does Kafka speak to the contemporary reader?" (p. ix)—does not address this question in a meaningful way. Loeb neglects to provide a context for her inquiry, and since she sets up a body of Kafka criticism that fails to take Kafka's Judaism into account as a straw man of sorts, from the outset it is not clear what purpose is served by the pairing of Brod's and Robert's perspectives. As the book unfolds, it becomes less and less clear how and why Loeb is using these two interpretations to enter a discussion that began almost immediately upon Kafka's death. The structure of the book contributes to further confusion about Loeb's purpose. While in her introduction Loeb claims that her analysis will move in a linear fashion, addressing three issues, "the Jewish elements of the writer's existential experience," "the cultural-historical background of the critics and an examination of their relationship to the Kafkaen text," and "a comprehensive inquiry, from the vantage point of the critics, into Kafka's work, and the conclusions to be drawn from it...