Nano-poetics and a nano-representation of the Israeli milieu in Yossel Birstein’s short-short bus-stories

ABSTRACT

This article discusses the unique nano-poetics and its nano-representation of the Israeli milieu, as found in Yossel Birstein’s short-short bus-stories. While these stories demonstrate the author’s poetics, they also constitute a miniature replica of Israeli society, emphasising the following four major aspects of this society: (1) the tension between the Jewish past and the Israeli present; (2) the complex dynamics between private and public life; (3) the gap between newcomers and veteran immigrants; and (4) a mentality dominated by nervous tension combined with the unique form of audacity known as chutzpah. Birstein presents the bus both as the inspiration for and as the object of his writing, and this narrative framework showcases the many variants in Israeli culture.

KEYWORDS:

• Hebrew literature
• Israeli culture
• Israeli literature
• Israeli society
• short-short story
• Yossel Birstein

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes

1. Abella, “Iridescent Insects,” 2–3.

2. Peters, “Minifiction,” 5–11.

3. Shapard, “The Remarkable Reinvention.”

4. Dimock, “Introduction”; and van Achter, “Micro-Fiction.”

5. Howe, “Introduction,” x.

6. See note 1 above; and Botha, “Microfiction,” 208.

7. Friedman, “What Makes,” 104.

8. Stewart, On Longing, 46.

9. Nelles, “Microfiction,” 93.

10. Irving, “Storytelling in Miniature.”

11. See note 9 above.

12. Friedman, Friedman, “What Makes”; and Stewart, On Longing, 53.

13. Kant, Critique of Judgement.

14. Schlegel, Athenaeum Fragment, 116.

15. Blanchot, The Athenaeum.

16. Nelles, “Microfiction,” 97.

17. Abella, “Iridescent Insects”; Nelles, “Microfiction,” 87–104; van Achter, “Micro-fiction”; and Shapard, “The Remarkable Reinvention.”

18. van Achter, “Micro-fiction,” 29.

19. The Short Story Project.

20. Peri, “Back from the end,” 377.

21. Inbari, “Kibbutz Stories.”

22. Peri, “Back from the end,” 347.

23. Sinclair, “Yossel Birstein.”

24. Domb, “Ideology, identity, and language.”

25. Birstein, Stories Dancing in the Streets of Jerusalem, 139.

26. See note 20 above.

27. Birstein, Stories Dancing in the Streets of Jerusalem, 127.

28. Ibid.

29. Ibid., 128.

30. Ibid., 129.

31. Ibid., 165.

32. Birstein, A Drop of Silence, 45.

33. Ibid., 47.

34. Birstein, Stories Dancing in the Streets of Jerusalem, 19.

35. Ibid., 90.

36. Ibid., 107.

37. Ibid., 108.

38. See note 20 above.

39. Levin, The Bus as a Symbol.

40. Mahalel, “Yiddish, Israel, and the Palestinians”; Novershtern, “The Multicolored Patchwork”; and Roskies, “Estates of Memory.”

41. See note 20 above.

42. See note 21 above; and Peri, “Back from the End,” 394.

43. Birstein, A Drop of Silence, 39–40.

44. Birstein, Stories Dancing in the Streets of Jerusalem, 85–86.

45. Levin, “From the meaning of the story”.

46. Peri, “Back from the end.”

47. Birstein, A Drop of Silence, 40; and Birstein, Stories from the Realm of Tranquillity, 86.

48. Peri, “Back from the End,” 351.

49. Birstein, A Drop of Silence, 29–30.

50. Ibid., 31–32.

51. See note 21 above.

52. See note 20 above.

53. Birstein, Stories Dancing in the Streets of Jerusalem, 21–22.

54. van Gennep, The Rites of Passage; and Turner, The Ritual Process.

55. Tsal, “A Stain of Silence.”

56. Flum & Cinamon, “Immigration and the Interplay”; and Bloemraad, Korteweg & Yurdakul, “Citizenship and Immigration.”

57. Birstein, interviewed by Peri, “Back from the End,” 342.

58. See note 55 above.

59. Birstein, Stories Dancing in the Streets of Jerusalem, 45–46.

60. Ibid., 119.

61. Birstein, A Drop of Silence, 40; and Birstein, Stories from the Realm of Tranquillity, 85.

62. Birstein, “When the Bus Driver Called,” A Drop of Silence, 33–34; and Birstein, “The Message,’ Stories Dancing in the Streets of Jerusalem, 91.

63. Birstein,”Springs,” Stories from the Realm of Tranquillity, 32.

64. Birstein, “Stolen Glance,” Stories Dancing in the Streets of Jerusalem, 95–97.

65. Birstein, ‘Portrait of a Line at a Bus Stop,” Stories Dancing in the Streets of Jerusalem, 127–129.

66. See note 61 above.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Orna Levin

Orna Levin is a Senior Lecturer in Education and Academic Director of the simulation centre at Achva Academic College, Israel.