The Contemporary British-Jewish Family and the Significance of Its Confines in "The Innocents", Francesca Segal’s Retelling of Edith Wharton

Abstract

After France, Great Britain has the second largest Jewish population in Europe. It is worth taking a closer look at the constantly evolving literature created by this minority. The tendency observed in recent years has been the interest of British-Jewish novelists in the subject of Jewish families from different communities. Some struggle with ultra-Orthodoxy, others are secular, while still others, as in Francesca Segal’s debut novel The Innocents, are in between the two extremes. The author decided to raise the subject of Jewish families by rewriting the acknowledged The Age of Innocence by Edith Wharton.