Yehoshafat Pop | University of Haifa (original) (raw)

Papers by Yehoshafat Pop

Research paper thumbnail of A Journey into the Intellectual World of the Romanian Jew, Mihail Sebastian, and His Witness during the Fascist Years

Both historiography and history of the Romanian Shoah are a matter which could be tackled without... more Both historiography and history of the Romanian Shoah are a matter which could be tackled without obstruction only after the fall of Communism (from the last decade of the past century on) with the accretion of documentary collection and the opening of archives that began in the 1990s. Then and then only, maybe finally and certainly more comprehensively, documents from Romania offered opportunities for studying a wartime regime that was second only to Germany in the killing of the Jews. The intention of this article is to create a very specific picture within the historiography of Romania’s fascism as well as its Holocaust, through the lenses of a historical figure who turned out to be one of the main catalysts for awareness of the Shoah in post-communist Romanian culture and society, namely that of Mihail Sebastian (born Iosef Hechter) and three sources written by him: the first one being his novel For Two Thousand Years / De două mii de ani (1934), the second a follow-up journalistic essay to his novel, entitled How I Became a Hooligan / Cum am devenit huligan (1935) and the third, his posthumously released Journal, 1935-1944, originally unintended for publishing. This study will deal with events and phenomena leading up to the Romanian Holocaust. The occupation with these various forms of literary witness will investigate the contribution of Sebastian to understanding the political but especially intellectual picture of the 1930s in Romania, up until the end of WWII. Equally, my hope is that the research will address questions referring to the protagonist's personal journey, his identity and position as Jew and intellectual in the midst of an increasingly anti-Semitic and fascist Bucharest intelligentsia.

Published in:
Holocaust. Study and Research – the sscientific journal of 'Elie Wiesel’ National Institute for the Study of Holocaust in Romania, vol. VI, no. 1(7)/2014, National Research Council index: B, Academic databases: CEEOL, EBSCO. Bucharest, Romania.

Research paper thumbnail of A Journey into the Intellectual World of the Romanian Jew, Mihail Sebastian, and His Witness during the Fascist Years

Both historiography and history of the Romanian Shoah are a matter which could be tackled without... more Both historiography and history of the Romanian Shoah are a matter which could be tackled without obstruction only after the fall of Communism (from the last decade of the past century on) with the accretion of documentary collection and the opening of archives that began in the 1990s. Then and then only, maybe finally and certainly more comprehensively, documents from Romania offered opportunities for studying a wartime regime that was second only to Germany in the killing of the Jews. The intention of this article is to create a very specific picture within the historiography of Romania’s fascism as well as its Holocaust, through the lenses of a historical figure who turned out to be one of the main catalysts for awareness of the Shoah in post-communist Romanian culture and society, namely that of Mihail Sebastian (born Iosef Hechter) and three sources written by him: the first one being his novel For Two Thousand Years / De două mii de ani (1934), the second a follow-up journalistic essay to his novel, entitled How I Became a Hooligan / Cum am devenit huligan (1935) and the third, his posthumously released Journal, 1935-1944, originally unintended for publishing. This study will deal with events and phenomena leading up to the Romanian Holocaust. The occupation with these various forms of literary witness will investigate the contribution of Sebastian to understanding the political but especially intellectual picture of the 1930s in Romania, up until the end of WWII. Equally, my hope is that the research will address questions referring to the protagonist's personal journey, his identity and position as Jew and intellectual in the midst of an increasingly anti-Semitic and fascist Bucharest intelligentsia.

Published in:
Holocaust. Study and Research – the sscientific journal of 'Elie Wiesel’ National Institute for the Study of Holocaust in Romania, vol. VI, no. 1(7)/2014, National Research Council index: B, Academic databases: CEEOL, EBSCO. Bucharest, Romania.