ABSTRACT
Ludwig Lewisohn, a Berlin-born Jew who made himself into a Southern Christian gentleman in Charleston, had to leave Columbia University in 1903 without his doctorate because he was, in the eyes of Columbia's English faculty, irredeemably Jewish. Susanne Klingenstein, a German-born Jewish teacher of writing at MIT who did her graduate work and research at Harvard, has made the story of resistance to and eventual acceptance of Jews by the English departments (mainly of Harvard and Columbia) her special province. More often, Klingenstein applies her descent/consent and binary principles to show how these men redefined Judaism (or Jewishness) to fit the American experience, and also reinterpreted America to fit Jewish modes of thought. Although Klingenstein's broad learning and luminous intelligence are still active. Klingenstein's second book deals only with literary scholars, and remains locked into the Harvard and Columbia worlds except for excursions to the University of Minnesota to trace the development of American Studies.
