Jan Neruda a Židé - Texty a kontexty – Frankl Michal (2013)

The anthology is the outcome of a workshop organized by the Jewish Museum in Prague and the Institute of Czech Literature of the Czech Academy of Sciences in 2010, which confronted the knowledge, opinions, and methodology of literary scholars and historians dealing with Jewish history and antisemitism. The selected contributions present Neruda's attitudes towards Jews, particularly his antisemitic treatise Pro strach židovský, in the context of the time and analyze it from various perspectives. Although the anti-Jewish character of various Neruda texts has often been mentioned, no work has yet addressed it in depth. The media discussion triggered by the workshop clearly demonstrated how important it is for Czech society to critically grapple with the complexity of its own relationships with Jews, not least because the pamphlet Pro strach židovský is currently available for download on several nationalist and antisemitic websites. The anthology includes a commented edition of the treatise Pro strach židovský as well as illustrations, primarily period images of Jews and antisemitic caricatures. It is published in collaboration with the Center for Jewish Studies at Charles University with the support of the Ministry of Culture of the Czech Republic.