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Trials of the Diaspora: A History of Anti-Semitism in England
Trials of the Diaspora is a ground-breaking book that reveals the full history of anti-Semitism in England. Anthony Julius focuses on four distinct versions of English anti-Semitism. He begins with the medieval persecution of Jews, which included defamation, expropriation, and murder, and
which culminated in 1290 when King Edward I expelled all the Jews from England. Turning to literary anti-Semitism, Julius shows that negative portrayals of Jews have been continuously present in English literature from the anonymous medieval ballad "Sir Hugh, or the Jew's Daughter," through
Shakespeare's Merchant of Venice , to T. S. Eliot and beyond. The book then moves to a depiction of modern anti-Semitism--a pervasive but contained prejudice of insult and exclusion that was experienced by Jews during their "readmission" to England in the mid-17th century through the late 20th
century. The final chapters detail the contemporary anti-Semitism that emerged in the late 1960s and the 1970s and continues to be present today. It treats Zionism and the State of Israel as illegitimate Jewish enterprises, and, in Julius's opinion, now constitutes the greatest threat to
Anglo-Jewish security and morale. A penetrating and original work, Trials of the Diaspora is sure to provoke much comment and debate.
which culminated in 1290 when King Edward I expelled all the Jews from England. Turning to literary anti-Semitism, Julius shows that negative portrayals of Jews have been continuously present in English literature from the anonymous medieval ballad "Sir Hugh, or the Jew's Daughter," through
Shakespeare's Merchant of Venice , to T. S. Eliot and beyond. The book then moves to a depiction of modern anti-Semitism--a pervasive but contained prejudice of insult and exclusion that was experienced by Jews during their "readmission" to England in the mid-17th century through the late 20th
century. The final chapters detail the contemporary anti-Semitism that emerged in the late 1960s and the 1970s and continues to be present today. It treats Zionism and the State of Israel as illegitimate Jewish enterprises, and, in Julius's opinion, now constitutes the greatest threat to
Anglo-Jewish security and morale. A penetrating and original work, Trials of the Diaspora is sure to provoke much comment and debate.
870 pages, Hardcover
First published February 14, 2010
18 people are currently reading
323 people want to read
About the author
Anthony Julius
20 books6 followersAnthony Julius (born 1956) is a prominent British lawyer and academic, best known for his actions on behalf of Diana, Princess of Wales and Deborah Lipstadt. He is a senior consultant for the London law firm Mishcon de Reya.
Julius is known for his opposition to new antisemitism, the alleged expression of antisemitic prejudice couched in terms of criticism of Israel, and gives frequent talks on the subject all over the world to raise awareness. He is a founding member of both Engage and the Euston Manifesto.
He is a son of a successful London textile merchant, educated at the City of London School. His father died young of a brain tumour. Julius studied English literature at Jesus College, Cambridge graduating in 1977 with a first class degree and completed a Ph.D. in English literature at University College London under the novelist and academic Dan Jacobson. He joined Mishcon de Reya, a Bloomsbury law firm in 1981 becoming a partner in 1984. Currently he is a senior consultant to that firm.
He married in 1979 and had four children with his first wife (Max, Laura, Chloë and Theo). In 1999, following his divorce, he married journalist Dina Rabinovitch who died in 2007. They have one son together (Elon). He remarried in July 2009.
Julius is known for his opposition to new antisemitism, the alleged expression of antisemitic prejudice couched in terms of criticism of Israel, and gives frequent talks on the subject all over the world to raise awareness. He is a founding member of both Engage and the Euston Manifesto.
He is a son of a successful London textile merchant, educated at the City of London School. His father died young of a brain tumour. Julius studied English literature at Jesus College, Cambridge graduating in 1977 with a first class degree and completed a Ph.D. in English literature at University College London under the novelist and academic Dan Jacobson. He joined Mishcon de Reya, a Bloomsbury law firm in 1981 becoming a partner in 1984. Currently he is a senior consultant to that firm.
He married in 1979 and had four children with his first wife (Max, Laura, Chloë and Theo). In 1999, following his divorce, he married journalist Dina Rabinovitch who died in 2007. They have one son together (Elon). He remarried in July 2009.
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Displaying 1 - 12 of 12 reviews
March 25, 2018
Of great value is the focus on anti-semitism in
English literature, especially since it was raised
by a GR relating to Wilde. Surgically studied are
Chaucer, Shakespeare, Dickens, who go far beyond asides and have created classic major characters that still cause tremors, for anti-semitism is ugly and ignorant.
Others under rumination are Trollope, Thackeray, George
Eliot, James Joyce, Graham Greene, Virginia Woolf --
the list runs on. OW is cited once, in a positive way,
w his epigram on charity. This scholarly hefty by
lawyer-writer (who needs a good editor) piles up
documentation. Footnotes extend over 100 pages,
a book unto themselves.
English literature, especially since it was raised
by a GR relating to Wilde. Surgically studied are
Chaucer, Shakespeare, Dickens, who go far beyond asides and have created classic major characters that still cause tremors, for anti-semitism is ugly and ignorant.
Others under rumination are Trollope, Thackeray, George
Eliot, James Joyce, Graham Greene, Virginia Woolf --
the list runs on. OW is cited once, in a positive way,
w his epigram on charity. This scholarly hefty by
lawyer-writer (who needs a good editor) piles up
documentation. Footnotes extend over 100 pages,
a book unto themselves.
May 25, 2019
Trials of the Diaspora is at least three books packed too tightly into one. Anthony Julius’s aim is to trace English anti-Semitism from its medieval roots to the present, a Herculean task which has obviously involved him in massive amounts of research (about 250 pp. of endnotes!)
His medieval investigation follows the accepted narrative in considering persecutions, massacres and above all the ‘blood libel’, culminating in the expulsion of 1290. We then move into nearly four centuries of ‘anti-Semitism without Jews’, a literary form most famously represented by Chaucer’s ‘Priestess’s Tale’, Marlowe’s Jew of Malta, and Shakespeare’s Merchant of Venice, followed by an effort to continue noting developments arising through the 18th, 19th, and 20th centuries. It’s in middle of the book that things become somewhat muddled, for as Julius admits, ‘Modern [English] anti-Semitism is ... often ambiguous in its expression, and when named as anti-Semitic, is often defended as humorous or ironic in intention’. Jews might be excluded from golf clubs and garden parties, sneered at and joked about behind their backs, never really considered ‘wholly English’ – but nor have they, in modern times, been subject to pogroms or state-organized mass murder.
Julius’s investigation of this modern non-violent Anglo-Saxon mode of anti-Semitism is laden with anecdotes and literary/print-media references. At one point he engages in a detailed analysis of Leopold Bloom, the Jewish co-hero of Joyce’s Ulysses, at another he attempts to corral English anti-Semites into four categories; he jumps back and forth in time – from a mid-20th-century newspaper account to an 18th-century play to something said by George Eliot. Nothing ever feels quite finalized. An example would be his quick look at Kingsley Amis, who privately, with unfunny silliness, could write about someone he disliked being ‘a joooo’, who opined that ‘the great Jewish vice is glibness, fluency ... also possibly just bullshit, as in Marx, Freud, Marcuse’ and that ‘being a Jew, no matter what you do or don’t do, you can’t help being one’. Amis also wrote that ‘anti-Semitism in any form, including the fashionable anti-anti-Semitism, must be combated’. Anti-anti-Semitism? Julius does not elaborate on these comments, merely concluding that Amis ‘could not be considered a ‘programmatic anti-Semite – he hated too indiscriminately, and too weakly’.
Finally, the last two sections of the book, devoted not to the prejudice faced by Jews within the UK but to contemporary anti-Zionism, take a completely new turn, arguing controversial points about the relationship between political criticism of the State of Israel, generalized anti-Zionism, and anti-Semitism. The author becomes less detached and more polemical; the reader is no longer gathering information, but being called upon to take a position on the stickiest issues in the tangled geopolitical mess that is the Middle East.
For a newcomer to the general discussion of anti-Semitism, this book may be overwhelming and indigestible unless read very slowly. Those with more experience will find interesting, thoughtful and useful examples to add to their knowledge, but may be frustrated by assumptions made in the last quarter. And I would have appreciated a bibliography!
His medieval investigation follows the accepted narrative in considering persecutions, massacres and above all the ‘blood libel’, culminating in the expulsion of 1290. We then move into nearly four centuries of ‘anti-Semitism without Jews’, a literary form most famously represented by Chaucer’s ‘Priestess’s Tale’, Marlowe’s Jew of Malta, and Shakespeare’s Merchant of Venice, followed by an effort to continue noting developments arising through the 18th, 19th, and 20th centuries. It’s in middle of the book that things become somewhat muddled, for as Julius admits, ‘Modern [English] anti-Semitism is ... often ambiguous in its expression, and when named as anti-Semitic, is often defended as humorous or ironic in intention’. Jews might be excluded from golf clubs and garden parties, sneered at and joked about behind their backs, never really considered ‘wholly English’ – but nor have they, in modern times, been subject to pogroms or state-organized mass murder.
Julius’s investigation of this modern non-violent Anglo-Saxon mode of anti-Semitism is laden with anecdotes and literary/print-media references. At one point he engages in a detailed analysis of Leopold Bloom, the Jewish co-hero of Joyce’s Ulysses, at another he attempts to corral English anti-Semites into four categories; he jumps back and forth in time – from a mid-20th-century newspaper account to an 18th-century play to something said by George Eliot. Nothing ever feels quite finalized. An example would be his quick look at Kingsley Amis, who privately, with unfunny silliness, could write about someone he disliked being ‘a joooo’, who opined that ‘the great Jewish vice is glibness, fluency ... also possibly just bullshit, as in Marx, Freud, Marcuse’ and that ‘being a Jew, no matter what you do or don’t do, you can’t help being one’. Amis also wrote that ‘anti-Semitism in any form, including the fashionable anti-anti-Semitism, must be combated’. Anti-anti-Semitism? Julius does not elaborate on these comments, merely concluding that Amis ‘could not be considered a ‘programmatic anti-Semite – he hated too indiscriminately, and too weakly’.
Finally, the last two sections of the book, devoted not to the prejudice faced by Jews within the UK but to contemporary anti-Zionism, take a completely new turn, arguing controversial points about the relationship between political criticism of the State of Israel, generalized anti-Zionism, and anti-Semitism. The author becomes less detached and more polemical; the reader is no longer gathering information, but being called upon to take a position on the stickiest issues in the tangled geopolitical mess that is the Middle East.
For a newcomer to the general discussion of anti-Semitism, this book may be overwhelming and indigestible unless read very slowly. Those with more experience will find interesting, thoughtful and useful examples to add to their knowledge, but may be frustrated by assumptions made in the last quarter. And I would have appreciated a bibliography!
July 15, 2018
Anthony Julius has written a thorough, scholarly and penetrating history of anti-Semitism in Britain, from the medieval rise of the blood libel and the expulsion of the Jews in 1290 through recent history. He is particularly good on the persistent theme of anti-Semitism in English literature. Julius shows that, after Jews returned to Britain, anti-Semitism mostly took the form of social exclusion and verbal hostility. From the time of the late Renaissance forward, it did not manifest itself in pogroms or other physical violence. Nevertheless, he clearly demonstrates its pervasiveness. The last chapters of the book address the degree to which hostility to Israel is, in his view, largely repackaged anti-Semitism. Those chapters are not as centered on the UK, and have a tacked-on quality to them. But while I found them weaker, it doesn't detract from my view that this is serious and important history, brilliantly done.
Read
July 6, 2022From Follett:
Traces the history of anti-Semitism in England from the Middle Ages to the twenty-first century, describing Edward I's expulsion of the Jews in 1290, anti-Semitic accounts of Jews in English literature, the treatment of Jews reentering England between the seventeenth and twentieth centuries, and anti-Zionism in the late twentieth century.
Traces the history of anti-Semitism in England from the Middle Ages to the twenty-first century, describing Edward I's expulsion of the Jews in 1290, anti-Semitic accounts of Jews in English literature, the treatment of Jews reentering England between the seventeenth and twentieth centuries, and anti-Zionism in the late twentieth century.
May 21, 2023
This is a challenging book to read - and a hard one to promote. (As the author points out, those who would benefit most are those least likely to read it.) In 'Trials of the Diaspora', Mr. Julius does the impossible: chart the evolution of anti-Semitism from its ancient, religious roots to its modern, secular forms. Alas, its message might never reach a wide readership.
Mr. Julius trained as a lawyer. He defended Deborah Lipstadt in her famous case against David Irving. Thus, he reviews the topic of anti-Semitism with professional objectivity. He posits each form of anti-Semitism, deconstructs its basic points, and exposes inherent fallacies. Legal training has prepared him well for the sewer in which he swims.
Readers might assume that anti-Semites have coherent reasons for hating Jews. Mr. Julius proves the opposite. Anti-Semites hate Jews instinctively, then spend (waste?) their lives trying to justify themselves. It's staggering how many Jew-haters will just MAKE UP their evidence. (Some of them are household names.) In short, their loathing is pathological.
The author has said this is his last book on anti-Semitism. We can't blame him: writing it must have taxed his sanity. Fortunately, we have no need of another. 'Trials of the Diaspora' is a thorough and detailed analysis, probably the greatest we'll ever receive. Regrettably, however, there might be an expanded edition in years to come.
Mr. Julius trained as a lawyer. He defended Deborah Lipstadt in her famous case against David Irving. Thus, he reviews the topic of anti-Semitism with professional objectivity. He posits each form of anti-Semitism, deconstructs its basic points, and exposes inherent fallacies. Legal training has prepared him well for the sewer in which he swims.
Readers might assume that anti-Semites have coherent reasons for hating Jews. Mr. Julius proves the opposite. Anti-Semites hate Jews instinctively, then spend (waste?) their lives trying to justify themselves. It's staggering how many Jew-haters will just MAKE UP their evidence. (Some of them are household names.) In short, their loathing is pathological.
The author has said this is his last book on anti-Semitism. We can't blame him: writing it must have taxed his sanity. Fortunately, we have no need of another. 'Trials of the Diaspora' is a thorough and detailed analysis, probably the greatest we'll ever receive. Regrettably, however, there might be an expanded edition in years to come.
August 3, 2010
An incredibly exhaustive examination of anti-semitism in England. (With close to 300 pages of notes!) Every facet is covered -- from religion to literature to politics. If you thought you knew everything about anti-semitism in England, you'll be surprised when you do learn something. But the author is a lawyer, and unfortunately he writes like one, which I found obscured a lot of what he was trying to convey.
This is a very compelling subject, and the book succeeds despite itself. But I wish it had been written in clearer, simpler language. It would have made for a very fascinating read. As it is, reading it feels more like a duty or an assignment.
This is a very compelling subject, and the book succeeds despite itself. But I wish it had been written in clearer, simpler language. It would have made for a very fascinating read. As it is, reading it feels more like a duty or an assignment.
October 3, 2010
More bad news. Author is a famous attorney. Well-organized and thoughtful catalogue. Parts of it read like an old college blue book - compare and contrast Fagin and Shylock - but he does tell us that that is what he did at school. I found the discussion of British attitude to modern Israel most interesting. I have often wondered about this after listening to BBC's coverage of Israel/Palestine.
December 12, 2012
Although I had some minor problems with the author's analysis of certain varities of contemporary anti-Semitism, over all, the book is a valuable addition to the study of the irrational hatred of Jews and Judaism. Moreover, apart from the author's overuse and misuse of the word "comprise" (hint: it means to "be made up of" or "to consist of"; it's not a synonym for "equivalent to," "is," or "constitute"), this volume was quite well written.
Read
May 7, 2014Skimmed rather than read - but at more than 500 pages on the theme of how appalling people can be to each other, reading the whole thing would have had me reaching for a bottle of Lexapro and downing the whole thing in one gulp.
January 17, 2011
I found that the book included an extensive amount of information. It thoroughly covered the subject.
September 30, 2014
As others have noted, this book is exhaustive in its examination of English antisemitism. Not an enjoyable read but fascinating and well written.
April 23, 2015
This is the ultimate resource on British Jewish history.
Displaying 1 - 12 of 12 reviews