Vilna (Polish Wilno), modern Vilnius and capital of Lithuania, was the traditional
spiritual and intellectual centre of Jewish thought in the Russian Empire. It
was often referred to as the 'Jerusalem of Lithuania', a term that has now
come to stand for the lost world of Jewish life in Europe. Most people today
learned what they know about this Vilna from autobiographies or personal
memoirs. This book takes a more objective look at how Vilna became a uniquely
important centre of the Jewish press. In particular it follows the
development of modernising Imperial Russia during
the second half of the nineteenth century.
Vilna is revealed as an important centre for the Jewish Socialist
Movement, the Bund, towards the turn of the nineteenth century and in the
years running up to the 1905 revolution. Bundist
journalism is discovered to be the sponsor of a Jewish Cultural ideology
called Yiddishism.
Susanne Marten-Finnis studied general
linguistics, translation and interpreting, Russian language and literature
and English language and American literature at Leipzig University. She
completed a postgraduate degree in Media Studies in Tubingen University followed by a PhD in
Applied Linguistics. In 1995 she joined the Queen's University of Belfast, where she is now a
Reader in German Studies. Her main area of research is the Jewish press in
Central and Eastern Europe before the Second World War.
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