No CrossRef data available.
Article contents
A Reading of Bernard Malamud's The Tenants
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 16 January 2009
Extract
A reader familiar with Bernard Malamud's works is likely to turn to a new novel by this well-established writer with certain expectations. He will probably count on meeting again Malamud's variant of the Yiddish shlemiel: the fool-victim, who is the butt of fate and men, bungling his way through life, but who somehow manages to endure it all, helped by his foolhardy persistence and his wry grimaces and shrugs. Among other strands that enter into the fabric of a Malamud novel or story there is the all-too-human female character – one hesitates to dub her ‘ heroine ’ – whose gift of love tends to be a dubious blessing. The male protagonist's personality and destiny are often given depth and scope through the motif of the double; this is not exactly the Romantic Doppelgänger, but rather two characters whose destinies are linked in various ways, sometimes in a (spiritual) father-son pattern. The heroic-unheroic action will very likely take place in an atmosphere of isolation and imprisonment, the ghetto being a prototypical setting. The past will most certainly play a small but important role as a means of creating depth and resonance; it may appear as history, legend or myth. Touches of a pastoral world – trees, flowers, birds – will hint at possibilities of freedom, purity and innocence. The shlemiel will never really be attuned to these happier strains; nevertheless there will most probably be a movement in his development toward a qualifies rebirth, a limited redemption, which will have to be bought with suffering and commitment. This might be the commitment of the artist, and the satisfaction of wholehearted dedication will be balanced and often outweighed by anguish and doubts of purpose and ability. Malamud always lightens the sombre picture with humour and wit; this is achieved by colourful ‘ Jewish ’ echoes: self-deprecating jokes and home-made sayings and proverbs which tend to reduce tragedy to something trivial and commonplace.
- Type
- Research Article
- Information
- Copyright
- Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1975
References
1 Malamud, Bernard, The Tenants (Penguin Books, 1972), p. 146Google Scholar. The Tenants was originally published in 1971 by Farrar, Straus and Giroux. Subsequent citations will refer to the Penguin edition and will appear parenthetically in the text. The British spelling used in this edition will be adhered to in quotations from the novel.
2 It appears that readers generally demand some sort of ‘redemptive’ ending in a novel. Flannery O'Connor recognized this need. She said: ‘There is something in us as storytellers and as listeners to stories, that demands the redemptive act, that demands that what falls at least be offered the chance to be restored’ (‘The Role of the Catholic Novelist’, Greyfriar [Siena Studies in Literature], 7 (1964), 10–11Google Scholar); quoted in Hoffman, Frederick J., The Art of Southern Fiction: A Study of Some Modern Novelists (Carbondale and Edwardsville: Southern Illinois University Press, 1968), p. 82Google Scholar.
3 Passages marked off by asterisks will be referred to as ‘sections’.
4 See The Tenants, pp. 43 (Blake), 15 (Wordsworth), 11, 23 and 84 (Coleridge), 84 (Keats), 85(Emerson), 25 (Frost), 11 and 30 (Defoe), 23 (Twain and Conrad).
5 I disregard such verbal forms as ‘shall/will + infinitive’ and ‘should/would + infinitive’, as being obvious exceptions.
6 When necessary a / will be used to indicate a new line in a prose passage.
7 This type of present tense, the so-called historic or dramatic present, which is used in narrative to create drama and a sense of immediacy, seems to be less common in fiction written in English than in, e.g., Scandinavian writing.
8 According to Malamud (interview NYTBR, 3 October 1971), he himself has no problems getting words on the page. A strict routine of daily work keeps him going.
9 This is in line with Malamud's own reading of the book. He thinks of it as a sort of prophetic warning against fanaticism (see interview NYTBR).
10 The hab rachmones cries call to mind the ending of a recent movie depicting the tragic fate of a group of Italian Jews (The Garden of the Finzi-Contint); the song mourning the victims of the Nazis made a very strong impression on countless spectators. One will have to admit that Malamud's concluding chant largely fails: the repetition of the word ‘mercy’ seems strained.
11 Cf. interview, NYTBR.