Bashevis Singer: tradição e modernidade

Abstract

This article discusses ambivalence in Bashevis Singer’s short stories. Based on the fact that the tension between tradition and modernity, in the context of literary productions clearly marked by the Jewish sociocultural background, is present in many short story writers since the nineteenth century, though it has been always handled in very different ways, and seeking the theoretical background of the contemporary Jewish short story specifically, we took into consideration Bashevis Singer’s short stories in which a schtetl, a Jewish´s village in Eastern Europe, appears as scenario. The brief analysis results in a well-defined proposition: by retaking powerful passions and fantasies, inspired by the Jewish mysticism and folklore, Bashevis Singer is actually showing a compelling oscillation between two worlds, two poles, under the sign of ambivalence, without necessarily making any judgment.