Newbury College English Professor Publishes a Second Book

A professor from Newbury College published a new book in the fall of 2017 that focuses on Jewish American writers and filmmakers that use a narrative style known as magical realism.

In November of 2017, Aaron Tillman a professor from Newbury College, published his second book; “Magical American Jew: The Enigma of Difference in Contemporary Jewish American Short Fiction and Film.”

The book is a critical take on a narrative technique known as magical realism.

“Works associated with magical realism tend to be those that possess a ‘co-presence’ of the natural and supernatural that is treated as normal by the narrator,” said Tillman.

The book is also an exploration of Tillman’s cultural identity, who was raised in a reform Jewish home in America.

“I am hoping to contribute something meaningful to the conversation about contemporary Jewish American identity and shine light on the potential of the magical realist mode for portraying anomalous cultural positions—not simply Jewish American, but U.S. ethnic identities more broadly,” he said

Tillman was at a conference for the Northeast Modern Language Association (NeMLA) last March in Baltimore where he met an editor from Lexington Books, who asked him to work with them.

The publishing process took around three months to complete which was somewhat surprising for Tillman since it was a lot quicker than he expected.

“I didn't have a ‘supervisor,’ exactly, but I worked with a few different editors. Initially, I worked with the acquisitions editor at Lexington Books who emailed me before the conference. She and I agreed on submission deadlines and negotiated contract details, and she sent along any feedback that came from outside readers,” he said.

Tillman said it was challenging to go from fiction in his last book to non-fiction in this book.

A colleague from Newbury College, Brendan O’Malley provided feedback on the drafts of the first chapter, and provided help for book descriptions, biographical details, and promotional ideas.

Another one of the of things O’Malley said he helped out with was setting up an Author Questionnaire, a series of questions made to make the book have more of a chance to be published and had also worked on organization of Tillman’s ideas in order to make things clearer for the reader.

O’Malley said that editing to the expectations of the author was a challenge, noting that Tillman didn’t want the book to seem bigger than it really was.

Tillman said he has had a passion for writing since his high school days and with a bit of guidance during college led him to pursue this craft, and had a great effect on himself.

The book is available online and at local libraries, including the Academic Center in Newbury College.