Hebrew Dreams in the Berlin of Yesterday: German-Jewish Symbiosis Fantasy on the City’s Streets in <i>Lifney Hamakom</i> by Haim Be’er and <i>Avedot</i> by Lea Goldberg

Abstract This article examines Berlin’s urban space as represented in the novels Lifney Hamakom by Haim Be’er and Avedot by Lea Goldberg. Based on close reading as well as distant reading methods (mapping, annotation, and visualization), the article argues that, despite being written in different periods, both novels are similar in their representation of space: neither novel depicts Berlin as an actual living city or as a concrete setting for their plots. Rather, in both novels Berlin’s space is seen as a symbol for a German-Jewish fantasy of symbiosis: cosmopolitanism in the spirit of Bildung . Poetically, however, this impression takes two different forms: while Avedot freezes the city as an image of potential symbiosis, Lifney Hamakom is significantly affected by the mass of symbols of the city’s space.