My Family Read That Too! The Soviet Jewish Bookshelf

On this episode of Don’t Know Much About, Naya Lekht sits down with Professor of Jewish Literature Marat Grinberg to discuss his book The Soviet Jewish Bookshelf: Jewish Culture and Identity Between the Lines. The conversation explores Grinberg’s original study of Soviet Jewish life and how books, especially those on Jewish history, became a crucial vehicle for Jewish identity and self-awareness.

Central to the discussion is Grinberg’s effort to reclaim Soviet Jewish life from a rigid binary that has long dominated how it is remembered: Jews who remained quiet and hidden versus those who were loud, defiant, and ultimately became refuseniks. Grinberg argues that this framework misses a vast middle ground, a different, often overlooked way of being Jewish in the Soviet Union, one rooted not in overt resistance or assimilation, but in cultural transmission, private study, and shared texts.

Sharing her own perspective on how Soviet Jewish life can be remembered, Naya joins Marat in a deeper exploration of how Jews lived and expressed Jewish identity under a totalitarian regime. In a state where access to Jewish religious sources was severely restricted, a striking and consistent phenomenon emerged: Jews across the Soviet Union, regardless of where they lived, often owned the same books. Why did this happen? And which specific texts did Russian-speaking Jews turn to in order to learn about their heritage?

Clarifying the complex. Step into my classroom.