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November 20, 1998/ 1 Kislev 5759, Vol. 51, No. 9
Judaism hits it big on publishers' listsGrowing audience for Jewish books spans traditions of learning and faithEMILY D. SOLOFF
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 The abundance of books available at stores like Terry Epcar's Israel Connection are evidence of an increasing national popularity in Jewish-themed religious translations and other literature relating to the faith. Photo by Mark Gluckman |
How else to explain the decision by Knopf to publish 40,000 copies (eight times the number many Jewish publishers consider likely for a best-seller) of Leon Wieseltier's "Kaddish"?
As the literary editor of The New Republic, this famous son's memoir of his attachment to his father, and of his bereavement after his father's death, might be expected to appeal to non-Jews as well as Jews. But "Kaddish" is not a heart-warming evocation of Wieseltier's memories. Much of its 588 pages is devoted to in-depth discussion of the halachic (Jewish legal) history of the kaddish (prayer usually said by mourners).
Amid the annual recognition of what is known nationally as Jewish Book Month, Knopf is one of dozens of trade publishers who currently have books of Jewish interest on their lists. But publication of Jewish books isn't limited to mainstream publishers.
"The publishing world around Judaica has divided into three sub-industries," says Ellen Frankel, editor in chief of Jewish Publication Society. Scholarly work in Jewish history, philosophy, and thought is published by the university and Christian presses; trade publishers aim toward the popular market."
In between, Jewish publishers have found their own niches. Three of them, Jewish Lights Publishing, JPS, and Jason Aaronson, turn out some 100 new titles per year. At least a dozen other Jewish publishers also release anywhere from two to 10 titles and more.
What does it all mean? More reading than a person, or a people, could do in a lifetime. The real test for Jewish books isn't whether 5,000 or 50,000 copies are sold in a year, but whether a book is still in print 100 years after it's first published, according to Frankel. JPS clearly expects to have one such long-living book in next June's release of a Hebrew/English Tanakh (Jewish Bible).
Meanwhile, Christian publishers such as the Paulist Press are enhancing Jewish as well as Christian libraries with books such as "The Classic Midrash" by Rabbi Reuven Hammer, whose "Entering the High Holy Days" was just published by JPS; "Selected Writings in The Talmud," edited by Ben Zion Bokser and Baruch Bokser; and "The Early Kabbalah," edited and translated by Joseph Dan and Ronald Kiener.
While JPS publishes 15 to 20 new titles a year, all of them of interest to Jews, Paulist - an ecumenical publisher with roots in the Roman Catholic Church - considers itself a medium-sized publisher with 90 to 100 new titles.
Dialogue between traditions
"We have a fair number of books in Jewish/Christian dialogue that allow ordinary believers to understand each other's tradition, or allow leaders to set up conversations to understand each other," says Brophy, pointing to the "Dictionary of the Jewish/Christian Dialogue," edited by Leon Klenicki and Geoffrey Wigoder; or "Hope Against Hope," interviews with Johann Baptist Metz and Elie Wiesel on the Holocaust.
"Christians are much more sensitive to Christian involvement in the Holocaust, and in looking at our tradition and understanding where we have made interfaith understanding difficult, if not impossible. We have to take Judaism seriously as a way of understanding our own tradition. How do we understand who Jesus is, if we don't understand his culture?" says Brophy.
Another category is books geared toward college and university students, useful not only in the field of religion, but crossing over into anthropology and history. Rabbi Stephen Wylen wrote his introduction to Judaism, "Settings of Silver," after several years of teaching in a Catholic university.
A third category, world spirituality, includes a significant number of Jewish titles.
"Back in the 1970s, we began publishing the classics of Western spirituality, in response to the interest in Eastern spirituality," says Brophy. "We've published well over 100 volumes of the writings of great spiritual teachers." That includes "Upright Practices, The Light of the Eyes," a devotional manual by Hassidic master Menahem Nahum of Chernobyl (translated by Rabbi Arthur Green). Paulist has also brought back out-of-print books in authoritative translations, including "The Tales of Rabbi Nahman of Bratslav," edited and translated by Arnold Band.
"All of our Jewish volumes (in this series) have Jewish scholars doing the introduction and translation," says Brophy. "Our insight was that doctrinal differences divide, but mystical traditions explore the same interior phenomenon of the believer. Jewish mysticism is not totally different from Christian. The language may be different, but the interior experience is the same." The books have withstood the test of time, as all are still in print, Brophy says.
pirituality has been an important category for Jewish Lights Publishing as well. The 8-year-old publishing house is mission driven. Publisher Stuart Matlins describes it as "an outreach program. What we are trying to do is reach Jews who think Judaism is not relevant to their lives and show them how very relevant it is. We started wanting to create inspirational literature based on Jewish wisdom literature. We turn down a lot of wonderful material because it doesn't fit within the goal of developing inspirational literature."
This month Jewish Lights releases a Rabbi Lawrence Kushner reader, "Eyes Remade for Wonder," and a new book of prayers, "The Gentle Weapon," from Rabbi Nachman of Breslov (the same Nahman of Bratslov published by Paulist).
The formula is working. Jewish Lights will ship a quarter of a million books this year, and has a number of titles which have been translated into 10 languages, including Korean. Matlins estimates that 40 percent of his audience is Christian.
Christian interest in Judaism is hardly new, notes Rabbi Burton Wax, a buyer for Rosenblum's World of Judaica in Chicago.
"Doubleday started publishing the Anchor Bible series more than 30 years ago, and it still isn't finished. We have always had non-Jewish customers, priests, ministers, nuns.
"There were always Christian publishers doing Jewish books," Wax adds. "What is new is that the Christian market for Jewish books is getting bigger."
The bigger market makes Jewish-content books more interesting to trade publishers, and that also attracts Jewish authors to the mainstream presses.
Marketing power helps
Since 1945, Schocken has published books of Jewish interest and maintains a back list that includes Martin Buber, Gerson Scholem, Franz Kafka, and Walter Benjamin, among others. Now part of Random House, Schocken has the marketing power to "put a book in every house," according to Arthur H. Samuelson, editorial director.
Schocken publishes 30 new titles a year, and most of them are of Jewish interest, according to Samuelson. But ask him, "What is a Jewish book?" And he responds, "Who cares? This is a concept that loses its usefulness as the definition becomes more clear. We are reinventing it all the time, just as 'What is a Jew?' is being reinvented all the time.
"What distinguishes us is that we don't publish books as specifically Jewish books," Samuelson says. "We are interested in reaching the broadest definition of Jew. Even in our most parochial mode, we try to be as cosmopolitan as possible."
"The books we publish are meant for a broad audience, Jews as well as non-Jews. We published Primo Levi because he was a great writer. He's Italian, Jewish, and wrote about the Holocaust, but most of all he was great writer. Jews are complicated."
| Still a best seller |
The "translation sells well in the Christian world. Christians are interested in the Old Testament," says Samuelson. "We sell a great number to the Evangelical market. Christians are very excited by a translation that gets you closer to Hebrew. Secular people are interested in the Bible as literature.
"We sell to all the Hillels in the country, because it is a translation that allows Orthodox and Reform students to study together, because of its close following of Hebrew text."
Volume II, The Early Prophets, is scheduled to come out next fall, according to Samuelson.
Schocken also publishes what Samuelson calls "tool books," such as Anita Diament's "Kaddish," which explains Jewish mourning customs, and books on Jewish wedding customs and converting to Judaism.
These are "aimed at a specific audience, but they transcend denominational considerations. They are post denominational," Samuelson says.
Samuelson identifies two growing audiences other than Jews: Christians who study Judaism to learn more about their own religion's history; and people of any faith who are simply interested in religion and have a hunger for something spiritual such as Kaballah (Jewish mysticism). A third audience is spouses of Jews, relatives of intermarried Jews and others who want to understand what the Jewish people are all about. This audience includes the children of intermarriage.
Looking to the future
Where does the competition leave Jewish publishers?
"Trade publishers understand that Jews buy books and read books disproportionately to their number," says JPS's Frankel. While books by Jews about spiritual searches - set against the Holocaust, or struggling to find self in American society - attract a market, those that focus on religion "have remained at Judaism 101. Books that are specifically about Judaism tend to stay at the introductory level," she says.
Even though "serious Jews study and casual Jews read," Frankel says, "the economics of publishing mitigate against the trade publishers publishing more serious books. Anything that sells less than 10,000 books is not viable for them. Anything that sells 5,000 is fabulous for us. There aren't many Jewishly specific books that will sell more than 5,000 copies.
"Even though there's a burgeoning interest in Jewish literacy and Jewish education, that is still an elite market to publish for. That's JPS's core market, and it is never going to be commercially profitable," Frankel adds.
Yet, after 110 years in the publishing business, JPS is planning for the future with projects, looking a decade ahead. "We are turning now toward books focused on timely and significant issues for the Jewish community, women's issues, theology. We are doing a series of books on Jews and medicine," says Frankel.
The most recent is "Matters of Life and Death: A Jewish Approach to Modern Medical Ethics," by Elliot Dorff. Another book due out this month is "Adoption and the Jewish Family," by Shelley Kapnek Rosenberg. "A Time to be Born," by Michele Klein, focuses on Jewish birth customs and traditions. Next month JPS will release an introduction to the thought of French philosopher Emmanuel Levinas by Ira Stone and Torah commentaries of the Hassidic teacher Sefat Emet, "The Language of Truth," translated by Rabbi Arthur Green. This month, Jewish Lights releases "Joy and Responsibility," 2nd Edition by Rabbi David Hartman.
Matlins says his company and others are doing well by catering to educated readers who are hungry to learn more about their religious and spiritual roots.
"What is happening in America is that we have created the most highly secularly educated Jewish community that has ever existed in the history of the world. Let it suffice to say our Jewish education is not as good," Matlins says. "The phenomenon that is taking place is that people in their 30s and 40s are taking their secular learning skills and saying, 'I want to learn about Judaism.' They have the skills to read inspirational material and highly demanding philosophical material."
And that is good news for Jewish publishing.