The Union Jack magazine dated June 6, 1925 dedicated entirely to the legend of the Wandering Jew. Most pages feature the detective story “Sexton Blake” – about the Wandering Jew who arrives in Jerusalem controlled by the British, and the remaining pages are articles dealing with the legend of the Wandering Jew, its origins, and an attempt to determine its authenticity (the issue is written in an antisemitic tone and takes a line of embracing the dark sides of the legend). Rare.
On the title page of the issue is an illustration of the Wandering Jew and the title: “The Case of the Wandering Jew”. The booklet opens with the detective story about the Wandering Jew who threatens the British Empire: “Here is something new in detective stories! The subject of the Wandering Jew has a history of hundreds of years behind it, and many of the romances this evil and melancholic figure went through. But never we think, has he appeared in a detective story … You will see how the coming of the mythical wanderer directly posed a threat to our empire…”. The plot of the detective story (Sexton Blake) has a distinctly antisemitic nature that gives the Jewish character a dangerous cunningness consisting of tension between Jews-Arabs-british, and it takes place in the Old City of Jerusalem under British rule in the 1920s. The plot unfolds (in installments) over almost all the pages in the booklet. While in between, “supplement” articles deal with the legend of the Wandering Jew under the title “The Wandering Jew”. The article’s author tries to clarify the historical origins of the legend about the Wandering Jew, and the transformations it underwent over hundreds of years, and what causes the legend to reappear again and again. Also appears another article about the Old City of Jerusalem and the holy places in order to explain the background to the central detective story in the issue about the Wandering Jew. It is interesting to note that the issue boasts of being the first to integrate the figure of the Wandering Jew into a detective story, according to it this was never done before.
28 p. Complete issue. Good – Very good condition.
