Michael Gold, Jews Without Money

Patrick Chura (University of Akron)

The Literary Encyclopedia. Volume 3.2.3: American (US) Writing and Culture: The Early Twentieth-century , 1900-1945.
Vol. editors: J. Michael Duvall (College of Charleston), Emory Elliott (University of California, Riverside), Dale Enggass (University of Utah), Matthew Hofer (University of New Mexico), Stephen E. Meats (Pittsburg State University), Tony Papanikolas (San Jose State University), Justin Parks (UiT - The Arctic University of Norway), Nick Selby (University of East Anglia)

Dates

First circulation or publication 1930

Places

United States (Country of Origin)

Genres and Modes

Novel

Resources

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Jews Without Money

, a best-selling work of autobiographical fiction published in 1930,is a vivid and historically important account of early twentieth century Jewish immigrant life in the tenements of Manhattan’s Lower East Side. It is the only novel of communist writer-editor Michael Gold, the leading proponent of leftist, “proletarian” literature in the United States between the world wars.

Gold articulated the political and artistic priorities displayed in Jews Without Money as early as 1921, when he published the seminal article “Towards Proletarian Art” in the Liberator, a radical journal he co-edited with black poet Claude McKay. Citing Walt Whitman as “the heroic spiritual grandfather” of proletarian culture, Gold called for a literature of heightened social

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1568 words

Citation: Chura, Patrick. "Jews Without Money". The Literary Encyclopedia. First published 22 September 2014 [https://www.litencyc.com/php/sworks.php?rec=true&UID=35491, accessed 23 April 2024.]

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