The Books of Jacob Reading and Writing Group is a multi-year interdisciplinary project dedicated to reading The Books of Jacob by Olga Tokarczuk, first published in Polish in October 2014, and subsequently in English translation in November 2021. An epic historical novel set in eighteenth century Eastern Europe, it gives an account of the rise of the movement around Jacob Frank, a Jewish-born, Christian convert messianic leader who both during his life and in his afterlives has been seen as an arch-heretic of modern Jewish history. Moving across genres of writing, memoir, letters, chronicles, sermons, and more, illustrated with maps and charts and other historical images, evoking characters and voices both human and possibly divine, The Books of Jacob is a remarkable achievement. The novel demands much of the reader who is drawn into a wondering, sometimes horrified, complicity with Frank and his efforts to sustain his project.
As a virtuoso portrait of a fascinating and significant historical religious personage, community, and event, The Books of Jacob invites attention from scholars of religion. Taking up threads that other readers and reviewers in Europe (and the US) have identified but not explored at great length, this reading and writing group will work together to consider the religiousness of the work. The group will pay particular attention to the registers and projects of writing religion(s) within Tokarczuk’s novel, using it as an occasion for reflecting anew on our own scholarly and interpretive strategies and practices for investigating, representing, and writing religion in the past and present.
