In her latest book, Life in Citiations: Biblical Narratives and Contemporary Hebrew Culture, Ruth Tsoffar studies several key biblical narratives that figure prominently in Israeli culture. Life in Citations provides a close reading of these narratives, along with works by contemporary Hebrew Israeli artists that respond to them. Together they read as a modern commentary on life with text, or even life under the rule of its verses, to answer questions like How can we explain the fascination and intense identification of Israelis with the Bible? What does it mean to live in such close proximity with the Bible, and What kind of story can such a life tell?
Ruth Tsoffar is an Associate Professor of Women’s Studies, Comparative Literature, and Judaic Studies at the University of Michigan.
Introduction: Biblical Habitus. 1. Costly Epiphany of Milk and Honey. 2. Gifts of Wounds: Isaac, Ishmael, and the Legacies of Abuse. 3. Ruth’s Homecoming: Meta-Bread, Transformation, and Offspring. In Lieu of an Epilogue: Ruptured and Departure: Palestinian Breadscape. Index.
"Interpreting Israeli-Jewish national themes from postcolonial, ethnic and feminist perspectives, the book offers a dialectical "negation of the negation" of hierarchical Zionist tropes, rather than a simple negative negation." - Uri Ram, Professor of Sociology, Ben Gurion University of the Negev, Israel.
