During and in the aftermath of the dark period of the Holocaust, writers across Europe and America sought to express their feelings and experiences through their writings. This book provides a comprehensive account of these writings through essays from expert scholars, covering a wide geographic, linguistic, thematic and generic range of materials. Such an overview is particularly appropriate at a time when the corpus of Holocaust literature has grown to immense proportions and when guidance is needed in determining a canon of essential readings, a context to interpret them, and a paradigm for the evolution of writing on the Holocaust. The expert contributors to this volume, who negotiate the literature in the original languages, provide insight into the influence of national traditions and the importance of language, especially but not exclusively Yiddish and Hebrew, to the literary response arising from the Holocaust.

'Literature of the Holocaust is an important work. More than an anthology, it is a comprehensive collection of significant essays by distinguished authors, who provide both an overview and deep insights into Holocaust literature in the major languages of the West ordinarily inaccessible to the English reading world … Moreover, it grapples with major issues in Holocaust literature, such as the use of testimony and song, and the use and misuse of history. Each essay provides a rich survey and entry point for the study of Holocaust literature. I thought I knew Holocaust literature well, yet this work has given me years of important reading ahead, for which I am grateful. Comprehensive, consistently excellent, clear and yet also concise … a disquieting work as any good work on the Holocaust must be. It is a work to be cherished.'

Michael Berenbaum - American Jewish University, Los Angeles

‘[This] book is highly recommended for libraries with large Holocaust collections and academic libraries that support Holocaust and/or literature curriculums.’

Chava Pinchuck Source: Association of Jewish Libraries Reviews

'Highly recommended.'

Source: Choice

'In Literature of the Holocaust, contributing authors at once add to this constellation by introducing hitherto untranslated texts to the canon of Holocaust literature; navigate through it by offering geographic and chronological analyses of literary responses to the Holocaust; and gesture towards its immensity.'

Natalie Woodward Source: Notes and Queries