Antiquated portrayals of Jews were often used to characterize that which was undesirable. These stereotypes have long been mainstays among authors such as William Shakespeare and Charles Dickens. Aside from characters like Shylock from The Merchant of Venice and Fagin (“Fagin the Jew”) from Oliver Twist, there are also Neil Klugman and Brenda Patimkin in Philip Roth’s Goodbye, Columbus. These two lovers were often reminiscent of the male and female stereotypes rife within Judaism. These are often qualities which are perceived characteristics in the masculine and feminine makeup within Jews. In a secular sense, Jewish men will be seen as inferior to Jewish women. This paper will explore these stereotypes and give them context within Goodbye, Columbus. It will also explore the historical contexts in which Roth, a Jewish author, lampooned the common Jewish archetypes such as the nebbish and the Jewish American Princess (JAP). Respectively, these archetypes best represent Neil and Brenda.

In order to progress with this paper, the definitions of nebbish and JAP must be explained. Nebbish is a Yiddish word used to describe a Jewish male who is neurotic and emasculated. They are often shy, meek, and lacking machismo. The pejorative term JAP refers to a Jewish woman who often has high social status. These women are often characterized as spoiled women who are only interested in material wealth and living comfortably. JAPs can often be seen as social climbers looking to marry rich, professional men.

The most common portrayal of a nebbish in recent times is Howard Wolowitz from the highly successful sitcom, The Big Bang Theory. Howard, played by Simon Helberg, is an astrophysicist who overcompensates for his lack of machismo by trying to be a womanizer. However, this is often tempered by the fact that he lives with his mother and has no father figure in his life. The failed attempts at having sexual liaisons with random women came to an end after meeting Bernadette Rostenkowski. She is an opinionated, non-Jewish woman who also asserts her dominance over Howard. She makes significantly more money than him, given that she works as a research chemist for a pharmaceutical company. Eventually, Howard and Bernadette got married and had two children.

Continuing with stereotypes in The Big Bang Theory, Howard’s mother has the stereotypical Jewish accent. She is portrayed as being overbearing and intrusive with Howard’s affairs. Furthermore, even though we never see Howard’s mother, we are led to believe that she is ugly and obese. The meddling old Jewish woman stereotype, in Yiddish, is known as the yenta. Yentas are often described as gossips who constantly insert their opinions where they do not belong. They are the types of women who commonly browbeat their children into dating, getting married, and having their grandchildren. However, Howard’s mother also objects to him marrying a non-Jewish woman and resents his growing independence. Howard finds himself torn between his family and his freedom. After his mother dies, Howard no longer feels compelled to be a doting son and eventually provides Bernadette with the attention she craves and deserves.

The most prominent example of the Jewish American Princess is the character of Fran Fine from The Nanny. In this sitcom, Fran Drescher portrayed a Jewish woman from Flushing, Queens who is hired by a wealthy British Broadway producer named Maxwell Sheffield. She has a large head of hair, wears skintight animal print outfits, talks with an exaggerated Queens accent, and often lies about her age. Some tropes often centered around Judaism are sandwiched between Yiddish words and jokes about marrying a rich man, namely a doctor or lawyer. This type of humor reinforces the stereotype that a Jewish-American woman must be a kept woman. This is further reinforced by the end of the series in which Miss Fine and Mr. Sheffield become husband and wife. She fulfills her dream of marrying a rich man. It is portrayed as a JAP fairy tale.

The movie version of Goodbye, Columbus was made in 1967. As noted by film critic Stephen Farber, the film is about how “[…]Neil is attracted to Brenda largely because of the exotic glitter off her nouveau riche world […]” (34). In the book, Neil is from Newark and Brenda is from Short Hills. Both are in New Jersey. In the film, Neil is from The Bronx and Brenda is from Westchester. As a New Yorker, I understand the change of location and the significance behind the specific settings of Neil and Brenda. This change of setting is more universally understandable, as New York is an area more in the public domain. It is a given that the New York Metropolitan Area has the largest Jewish population outside of Israel. From a New Yorker’s perspective, The Bronx is often known as being the poorest of the five boroughs; whereas Westchester is considered to be a more ritzy and bourgeois part of the tri-state area. For context, the tri-state area I refer to consists of New York, New Jersey, and southern Connecticut. Moreover, it provides an archetype for identifying socioeconomic status.

Barbara Frey Waxman wrote an article titled “Jewish American Princesses, Their Mothers, and Feminist Psychology: A Rereading of Roth’s Goodbye, Columbus.” She offers a take on the often maligned term “Jewish American Princess” as it applies to Brenda. Waxman writes that, “[Brenda] has been born into wealth and raised to have a taste for luxury and status in her apparel and mode of living” (93). This is evident when Brenda undergoes rhinoplasty. The most stereotyped image of a Jewish person is a big nose, or “bumpy” in the case of Brenda (Roth 13). Furthermore, Brenda mentions about her nose job that she “[…]was pretty [and then became] prettier” (Roth 13).

Further expanding upon the stereotype of noses, there was an article written by Roy Goldblatt titled, “As Plain as the Nose on Your Face: The Nose as the Organ of Othering.” In this article, Goldblatt explores the antisemitic roots of associating the Jewish people with bulbous noses, wide nostrils, and nasal voices (564). Antisemites in power associated this particular quality as a genetic taint. Specifically, the ethos of Central European racial theory is that “the Jew was immutable, and could not be acculturated, and that the Jewish stain was indelible. Thus the Jew had to be segregated[…]” (Goldblatt 565). Such associations run deep in the Jewish community. Regardless of how many shades of Judaism exist in our world, the Ashkenazi Jew was often seen as the standard for pigeonholing the Jewish people as subhuman and parasitic creatures who offended the sensibilities of the Aryan standard.

Throughout the novella, Neil Klugman associates people’s social status with their religious nature. He is often curious about the Jewish observances of this nouveau riche family assimilated within a white normative and aristocratic culture. This is evidenced by how “Mrs. Patimkin [repeatedly directs] Carlota not to mix the milk silverware and the meat silverware […]” (Roth 24). In more Orthodox Jewish households, there are two separate kitchens for milk products and meat products. The mixture of meat and dairy is taboo in Jewish dietary law, or kashrut. Mrs Patimkin confirms that she’s an Orthodox Jew, her husband is a Conservative Jew, and Brenda is non-observant (89). Neil assesses Brenda as being “[…]conservative [or] maybe a little reformed” (Roth 89).

Daniel Walden wrote an article titled “From Columbus to Portnoy: The Evolution of Philip Roth’s Jewish American.” Walden makes references to how Roth’s age diminished what he thought could have been a more complex narrative. Namely, Walden states that “[Neil] was twenty-three years old, an aspiring author, unsure of his talent, but very sure that he was “just Jewish[…]” (38). As we delve into the love story of Neil and Brenda, many will see the former as a man whose “[…]youth [stood] in the way, i.e., his immaturity, as well as his perception that [he and Brenda’s] slightly different social background [was] of importance” (Walden 39).
Berel Lang, in an article about Jewish culture, states that, “At least on this celebratory occasion, the onetime charges against Roth of Jewish self-hatred and vulgarity were set aside[…]” (150). This brings up another important trope within Jewish-American assimilation. That is the archetype of the self-loathing Jew.

This concept could be related to a number of different societal factors. Firstly, in a white normative society, it is easy for Ashkenazi Jews to hide their identity under the guise of whiteness. Many Jews may downplay their culture so as to avoid prejudice from their non-Jewish peers. Alternatively, the self-loathing Jew will only appear to be self-loathing in the context of a society excluding the Jewish people. Many Jews will dissent against a paradigm in which there must be loyalty without accountability. I speculate that Neil would fit into the latter category. I doubt that he is self-loathing and in fact provides a satirical look at the aforementioned stereotypes of the Jewish people.. However, his questioning of the Jewishness of the Patimkin family is simply rooted in his own limited experience. Given the Patimkins’ affluence, he believes that socioeconomic status and religiosity are directly correlated. In another article written by Sam B. Girgis, the author writes, “Those who still regard Roth [as self-hating] should read his account of the situation and witness the obvious pain and confusion he felt from such charges” (145). In other words, one must explore the worldview of the author before judging the merit of their work.

Jewish-Americans like myself have faced prejudice in many different forms. Many times, I’ve heard people espouse conspiracy theories. Many of them can directly be traced back to Jewish stereotypes. This especially relates to our wealth, given the status of the British banking family, the Rothschilds. Moreover, many still believe the blatant conspiracy theories from the forgery that was “The Protocols of the Learned Elders of Zion.” This outlined the biggest conspiracy theory about the Jewish people being hell bent on world domination. This propaganda can be damaging. Neil Klugman is a young man still discovering what life has to offer. It was an important milestone for him to realize that his own Jewish identity was the antithesis of Brenda Patimkin’s lack thereof. Neil aims to be the antithesis of such pigeonholing and othering.

In another article by Goldblatt, “The Whitening of the Jews and the Changing Face of Newark”, the author “analyze[s] the change in the ethno-racial position of Philip Roth’s Newark Jews, their shift from Other to in-between and later to white, and then describe[s] the changes that occurred in the city itself, or how a Jewish ghetto that provided safety and security to its community later became the destroyed dead place in which it is portrayed” (Goldblatt 87-88). He further states that, “Eastern European Jews and European ethnics moved upward sociallyand economically and out of the ghettos – sufficiently whitened – to achieve
almost full assimilation into American society” (89). As previously stated, Eastern-European Jews, or Ashkenazim, have oftentimes been the golden standard of the culture. Although Jewish people come in various colors, there is a standard of white supremacy which exists in the community. That same privilege does not exist among Sephardim, who originate from the Iberian Peninsula and Northern Africa. It is the same situation for Mizrahim, who are indigenous to the Middle East. Furthermore, Jews originating from sub-Saharan Africa will not just face the slings and arrows of being black strictly among white passing Jews. They will face these prejudices within the Jewish community as a whole and succumb to the gatekeeping which inherently exists within more religious sects of Jewish culture.

When someone passes as white, they are afforded more privilege. The assimilation of Jews in American culture is one which is real. In many cases, the Klugmans and the Patimkins wouldn’t have even been able to enter country clubs, let alone fall in love there. In the case of Brenda, she and her family made it a point to revel in the privilege that came with them embracing the normative nature of whiteness. As a Jewish-American, I have certainly seen the ways in which my own family have assimilated into a culture dominated by non-Jewish Caucasians. Many of them have white collar jobs in law, medicine, and finance. My extended family will play golf and tennis on the weekends. Additionally, many members of my bloodline belong to country clubs which were once exclusive to Jews.

In an article by Rachel Kranson, she explores the history of Jewish employment in relation to the high status many men enjoyed in America after World War II. Namely, Kranson mentions how “[…]13.8 percent of Jewish men worked in a professional field, as opposed to 8.8% of non-Jewish men (99). Furthermore, Jews became successful entrepreneurs. Kranson continues by stating that “[w]hile 55 percent of Jewish men had been self-employed at the onset of the post-war period, 31.8 percent of Jewish men continued to own their own businesses by 1957 (99).While many Jewish men excelled in white collar and entrepreneurial fields, it’s a general scenario in which one must be born into privilege.

In Judaism, there is a concept called tikkun olam. This is the innate sense of duty felt by the Jewish people. Literally, the phrase means “repair the world.” Neil helping the black boy with educating him on Paul Gaugin is an example of tikkun olam. Whereas his fellow coworkers derided the child as being a degenerate and a kid looking to menace through the books, Neil saw the humanity in him. These are qualities which often go unnoticed due to the mainstreaming of antisemitic propaganda and blood libel. This is in stark contrast to the Patimkins, who value their status more than humanity as a whole. Philip Roth, in an article by Theodore Solotaroff, “deals with his situations and characters in the rare, right way[…] without piety or apology or vindictiveness” (88).

Moreover, Neil had a sense of duty. He had far more pathos for those unlike himself. Specifically, this refers to issues of racism. While Neil is sitting with John McKee in the library, John exclaims, “Has a little Negro boy passed the desk? With a thick accent? He’s been hiding in the art books all morning. You know what those boys do in there” (Roth 35). Instead of giving into racism, Neil follows the boy and hides a Paul Gaugin art book so the boy can observe and learn from the art. He spends time with the boy teaching him about Tahiti (Roth 37). This archetype is known as the mensch. Colloquially, it refers to a genuinely good man. In the face of blatant racism and discrimination, he stands up for the boy and reassures him that not all white people possess bigoted attitudes. Generally, Neil proves that people from adversely poor situations often tend to have more empathy for those who are downtrodden and subjected to bigotry and prejudice.

Revisiting tikkun olam, this concept is often offset by the antiquated antisemitic stereotype that Jews are stingy and miserly. Additionally, Jews as a whole are considered to be clannish gatekeepers. These qualities are often characteristic of more observant sects of Judaism. However, these particular traits are often used to paint Judaism in its entirety with a broad brush, characterizing even the most secular and Reform Jews with these negative stereotypes.

Speaking from my own experience working in the Chasidic community of Borough Park, Brooklyn, I can attest that this view is fallacious. However, this is taking into account that the setting of Goodbye, Columbus is in the 1950s time period. I worked in this community from 2019 to 2021. Taking these factors into account, the more religious communities are far from affluent. Many a time, Chasidic Jews will be on government assistance for the purpose of taking care of their religious studies and their children. Moreover, Chasidic Jews are often associated with having copious amounts of children. Before Moses read the Decalogue upon Mount Sinai, The Ten Commandments are preceded by the phrase, “Be fruitful and multiply.” This is often taken to the extreme in more religious communities. Oftentimes, conceiving a child on the Jewish Sabbath, or Shabbat, is considered to be a mitzvah. This concept, pluralized as mitzvot, refers to the 613 commandments in the Torah. In Judaism, the Torah is the name given to the first five books of the Bible (Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy). This is the holiest of texts in Judaism.

Having worked in a Jewish adult home for mentally ill men, I’ve seen the racism and bigotry exhibited by the Chasidic Jewish community at large. There is division between the ultra-Orthodox branches of Judaism and secular Jews. The divide is so extreme that many Chasidic Jews will not consider secular Jews to be authentically Jewish because they don’t keep a kosher home or observe Shabbat. There are also a multitude of racial slurs which exist within the Yiddish language. For the purposes of tact and remediation, I will not share said words.

Ultra-Orthodox communities are also known for being conservative with their resources. If a fellow community member is suffering, donations will be made to the local synagogue for their betterment and healing. Furthermore, these communities often try to be self-sufficient. Such services include food pantries, ambulance services, and neighborhood watches. Respectively, these services are known as COJO (Council of Jewish Organizations), Hatzalah (Jewish ambulance service which means “rescuers”), and Shomrim (Jewish community policing which means “watchers”). These services are meant to be accommodating to the Jewish community at large.

There is a mythos which often surrounds the Jewish people in that the community is often maligned with prejudice. Many parts of the country will know absolutely nothing about the tenants of Judaism, but are brought up to believe the Jewish people are inherently evil. In my own experience as a Jewish-American, I have experienced said prejudice firsthand and secondhand.

With the former, I’ve had to dispel certain stereotypes about the Jewish people being rude, arrogant, and unwelcoming to outsiders. In one of these instances, I wanted to address this situation with poise and remediation. At this juncture, I had no direct knowledge of the goings-on in the Chadisic Jewishcommunity. I was 18 years old when I had this conversation with a fellow college student, a black woman. All I could say in response was that I was accommodating and would invite anybody to my holiday gatherings (Chanukah, Passover, etc.)

Now that I am much older, I came to realize that this woman had no idea that Reform Jews like myself exist. Given that I went to a college in Brooklyn with a predominantly Caribbean population, I had no concept of people’s unconscious antisemitism being rooted in fear. Whereas, growing up in a predominantly Republican and Catholic area of New York City (Staten Island), many antisemitic views were rooted in bigotry, ignorance, and hatred. A large part of me wished I could travel back in time and reassure this woman that unlike more insular communities, I am someone who embraces diversity and does not possess views which expose sheltered outlooks.

In another instance, I used to volunteer at an environmental protection/social justice organization in college. I heard antisemitic views from another volunteer and stayed quiet in that instance. I let this woman get to know me. At a voter registration drive, I mentioned that I was Jewish. She realized that I walked in on this particular conversation and she swiftly apologized to me. We exchanged ideas about our respective spiritual beliefs. If I remember correctly, she was a Rastafarian. The beauty of being a college student on this particular campus was that 22 different languages were spoken and there were numerous clubs students could join. The campus space where I volunteered was shared by the Muslim Students Association and the Black Student Union. There was a Jewish club on campus, but I felt uncomfortable joining because I was not a particularly observant Jew during my undergraduate years.

These two examples lead into another concept: Jewish identity. In the article, ‘I’m Just Jewish …’: Defining Jewish Identity in Philip Roth’s Goodbye, Columbus and Five Short Stories”, Patrick Silvey explores what it means to be Jewish under personal and collective circumstances. Acknowledging a point I made previously, Silvey states, “Many within the Jewish community took issue with Roth’s portrayal of the Jewish cultural and religious identity, labeling him a self-hating Jew” (60). Silvey argues that “Roth exposes the social class distinctions that have been made within and among the American Jewish community. More importantly, he demonstrates that the concept of social class is necessarily unsympathetic, and is therefore decidedly non-Jewish. In other words, social climbing Jews, such as the Patimkins, would seem to have lost the sympathy that ought to define their Jewish identity” (Silvey 64).

From a personal standpoint, I agree with Silvey’s second statement. Materialism is not inherently a value in Judaism. Oftentimes, Jewish people have been very charitable people, such as Neil. When he observes the shallow nature of Brenda and her family’s ways, he realizes that they are the complete antithesis of who he represents. Their abundance of food and lavish wedding for Brenda’s brother Ron notwithstanding, Brenda does not share the same soul with Neil. She feels like their relationship wouldn’t work because of a difference of breeding. Neil would not have been satisfied with her shallow ways. In the end, their relationship was doomed from the beginning.

In conclusion, Roth’s creation of Neil Klugman and Brenda Patimkin showcased exactly what kind of representations exist among the Jewish people. I can even speak from my own experience in saying that I know a number of people and families akin to the Patimkins. Many of them are affluent. Many of them engage in conspicuous consumption. Many of them are Jewish. There is no changing antiquated Jewish stereotypes in our lifetime. There is no changing antisemitic attitudes among others. However, there is hope that Jewish people everywhere can bring out the best in our culture. We as Jews are a giving and kind people who have been marred by antisemitism in words and actions. There is a reason antisemitism is considered the longest hatred. We’ve had enemies since the rise of Moses.

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