Improving Jewish Literature (merged)

bashinda

Sun, Apr 13 2008, 8:48 pm

momof6 wrote:

There is great reading (great audio and video too)material on chabad.org and pesach.org (entertaining, stimulating, thought provocing and pure escapest stuff, written by Jews of all stripes- I personally can't get enough)

escapist stuff on chabad.org? Can you name some please? Chabad.org doesn't come to mind when I think of a Jewish website with escapist literature.

ClaRivka

Sun, Jul 27 2008, 10:44 pm

I have read alot abt the fact that Jewish literature or the genre is not as great as "non jewish" writing.

So what are you ladies looking for? What do you want to read? What type of writing are you looking for? Let us "unknowledgable" ppl in on the secrets!

Lady Godiva

Sun, Jul 27 2008, 10:49 pm

I enjoy the challenge of reading and understanding words out of my vocabulary. I love stumbling upon big words that I've never come across before. I haven't had that experience in the Jewish books I've picked up.

Crayon210

Sun, Jul 27 2008, 10:54 pm

I like to read about characters who are realistic. Not the evil materialistic Hungarian mother-in-law. Not the spoiled son-in-law in kollel who won't even polish his own shoes. Not the saintly grandmother who says Tehillim all day and has never said or done a bad thing against anyone.

The characters in these books tend to be very flat, have no personality besides for a caricature, no real internal struggle. An interesting struggle is not "how will I pay the rent?" or "How do I find the best shidduch for Moishy?" Moral dilemmas, internal struggles, etc., are much more interesting.

The writing also tends to be very bland. Someone once posted here something that was very true about writing: you should allow the reader to come to the conclusion that Shira is sensitive about her weight, not say, "Shira is sensitive about her weight, so she bought a black dress for her date with Shloimy." BORING. Lead the reader to the conclusion that Shira is sensitive about her weight.

mummiedearest

Sun, Jul 27 2008, 10:56 pm

I like, being able, to read, a sentence, that doesn't, have commas, after, almost, every word, thereby, breaking up, the meaning of, the sentence. and I like not being distracted from the book by constant spelling and grammar errors, along with misuse of language. it also bugs me when authors feel the need to express their poetic abilities by using the word "yet" at every opportunity. I also hate reading books written in yeshivish rather than English. unless it is part of the dialogue, I don't want to see any expressions like "chani was about to plotz when..."

it bugs me about as much as when "hashem elokenu" is translated as "hashem our hashem." that's right, people, I dared bring up the controversial topic... G-d is a word, and it is not blasphemy. and it is the proper word in certain circumstances, as in the example above. I HATE when people "clean up" perfectly legitimate english words by replacing them with hebrew. in speech it's one thing, but literature SHOULD NOT be written in the vernacular.

Crayon210

Sun, Jul 27 2008, 11:01 pm

Word usage is a biggie for me too (see The Double Life of Chani Ackerman). Put the thesaurus away. Reading is not about using the biggest words you can find in the thesaurus.

I also don't like when books become mussar lessons. They usually involve long, drawn-out monologues from the father to the son about the importance of learning, from the husband to the wife about the importance of bitachon, blah blah blah. NO.

I'll think of more.

Maya

Sun, Jul 27 2008, 11:04 pm

I second what Crayon wrote about characters having no depth.

Also, secular literature authors have writing style. For some reason, Jewish novels all sound the same., with short, choppy sentences and boring words. I can never identify a paragraph as a certain author's work. The writing style is simply terrible, like a high school student's in creative writing class.

chaylizi

Sun, Jul 27 2008, 11:05 pm

Crayon210 wrote:

that book should have been a third of the size.

mummiedearest

Sun, Jul 27 2008, 11:06 pm

ooh, ooh, and when the plot is totally lame. oh wait, are there really plots? wake me up when you can identify a proper, BELIEVABLE plot. cause the kid managed to keep the siddur with him the WHOLE TIME while being interrogated by the inquisition. and managed to keep a perfect hebrew calendar while in hiding. heck, the nine-year-old built himself an eruv around the island all by himself so he could carry on shabbos. it really wasn't that hard, he learned the halachos in depth in first grade.

Lady Godiva

Sun, Jul 27 2008, 11:07 pm

mummiedearest wrote:

That doesn't really bother me. I find that moving and inspirational...as long as it's a biography.

chaylizi

Sun, Jul 27 2008, 11:11 pm

Crayon210 wrote:

You mean you don't think we had to read all about how thirsty Chani was and so she drank out of the negel vasser? Rolling Eyes

no, actually I don't. surprise!! did anyone else sleep through the whole ny part of the book? you know, where chani was "finding herself"?

leomom

Sun, Jul 27 2008, 11:14 pm

I cringe when I see dialogue tags (he said, she said) on EVERY line of dialogue, even when only two people are conversing.

I also cringe when every dialogue tag has an adverb (she said tenderly) or a gerund phrase used as an adverb, especially when it is lacking a comma (he said chopping onions) -- and especially when it's a LONG gerund phrase (he said chopping onions for the potato salad which would be brought to the picnic that afternoon).

I also cringe when an author refuses to use the perfectly good word "said," and instead uses "he sputtered," "she drawled," "he cried" -- or worst of all, "she smiled." People don't smile words. They might smile before or after they say words, but they don't smile words. They also don't say things through clenched teeth.

Lady Godiva

Sun, Jul 27 2008, 11:17 pm

Come to think of it, I can't remember the last Jewish book I read. I know I've given one or two a chance a while back but when I go into a Jewish bookstore it's just to pick up some kippas for my boy. I never even bothered looking at the books there. Now I see I shouldn't bother.

chaylizi

Sun, Jul 27 2008, 11:17 pm

yy wrote:

mummiedearest

Sun, Jul 27 2008, 11:20 pm

yy wrote:

...she typed, crying hysterically, causing the milk to spill in the chicken salad she was to have brought to her third nephew's upsherin later that day with a smile....

leomom

Sun, Jul 27 2008, 11:26 pm

There is one series of young adult books (it has the word "camp" in the title) that is written in an almost incomprehensible style. This is a book for kids, and every other word is a polysyllabic thesaurus word. I'm all for having some 10-point words for kids to stretch their vocabulary, but I tried reading a book from this series to my daughter and my tongue went completely numb.

Please don't write off ALL Jewish books, though. There are some better choices out there. Sometimes I am pleasantly surprised. I will try to remember which books exceeded my expectations...