Nineteenth-Century Jewish Literature

A Reader

Jonathan M. Hess, Maurice Samuels, Nadia Vaiman

• Publisher: Stanford University Press
• Year: 2013
• ISBN:
  9780804786195
• Edition: 1
• Topic: History
• Subtopic: Jewish History
• Index: History

Recent scholarship has brought to light the existence of a dynamic world of specifically Jewish forms of literature in the nineteenth century—fiction by Jews, about Jews, and often designed largely for Jews. This volume makes this material accessible to English speakers for the first time, offering a selection of Jewish fiction from France, Great Britain, and the German-speaking world. The stories are remarkably varied, ranging from historical fiction to sentimental romance, to social satire, but they all engage with key dilemmas including assimilation, national allegiance, and the position of women. Offering unique insights into the hopes and fears of Jews experiencing the dramatic impact of modernity, the literature collected in this book will provide compelling reading for all those interested in modern Jewish history and culture, whether general readers, students, or scholars.

Section 1

Literature and the Invention of the Ghetto

Leopold Kompert, “The Peddler” (1849)

Translated from the German by Jonathan M. Hess

Leopold Kompert (1822–86) hailed from the Jewish district of a small town in Bohemia, a region of the Austrian empire that is part of the Czech Republic today. Kompert was part of a generation of Bohemian Jewish intellectuals who left behind the relatively insular worlds inhabited by their ancestors and took advantage of new possibilities open to Jews in the Austrian empire. Like many of his peers, Kompert attended German-language schools and universities, eventually coming to identify wholeheartedly with both democratic politics and the liberating force of secular culture. After stints as a private tutor, he became a journalist and eventually established himself as a writer in Vienna, where he held offices in the Jewish community and served on the city council.

Kompert’s literary career began in earnest with his breakout volume Aus dem Ghetto (From the Ghetto, 1848), a collection of tales that built on the interest in regionalism and local color that dominated much German prose fiction in the aftermath of Berthold Auerbach’s best-selling Schwarzwälder Dorfgeschichten (Black Forest Villages Tales, 1843). The ghetto tale eventually came to be one of the dominant genres of German-Jewish literature in the nineteenth century. Kompert was not the first bard of the Jewish ghetto, but following the publication of Aus dem Ghetto and its sequel volumes—Böhmische Juden (Bohemian Jews, 1851), Neue Geschichten aus dem Ghetto (New Stories from the Ghetto, 1860), and Geschichten einer Gasse (Stories from the Jew’s Street, 1864)—he became one of the most popular. His works went through numerous editions in the nineteenth century, enjoyed a wide readership among Jews and non-Jews alike, and were translated into many languages, including Czech, Dutch, English, French, Hebrew, Italian, Romanian, and Yiddish.

“Der Dorfgeher” (The Peddler) first appeared in 1849 in Julius Fürst’s weekly newspaper Der Orient, a periodical that targeted both Jews and non-Jews interested in Jewish scholarship and current events. It was subsequently republished in Kompert’s second major anthology of ghetto tales, Böhmische Juden, and republished yet again in Kompert’s complete works. In its explicit concern with the tensions between tradition and modernity, its treatment of assimilation and intermarriage, and its sympathetic portrayal of traditional Jewish life, it exemplifies Kompert’s efforts to create prose narratives for the general public celebrating the noble sufferings of the Jewish past.

. . .

One Friday afternoon, a hurried boy carrying a heavy folio volume under his left arm came leaping out of the rabbi’s house, which stood right next to the synagogue. The child seemed to be around eleven, and his face was glowing. Perhaps this was due to the passion of inner excitement, or simply to the weight of the book he was carrying. In this moment, at any rate, he had a wonderfully beautiful expression on his face! Lots of people were either standing around or walking through the street, but no one thought to ask this boy about his rosy cheeks or the drops of dew glistening on his forehead! To do so one would have had to have been God himself, but also without compassion. Disturbing children when they are running with joy is like throwing stones into the path of the blind, and the Bible forbids this!

But when the boy went by the “Schlafstube,” the place where itinerant beggars sleep on the Sabbath, one of these guests did not want to let him go by without asking him a question.

“Young boy,” the beggar exclaimed, “can you tell me something?”

Like someone running down a steep mountain, the child could only make himself stop with considerable effort.

“What?” he asked while turning himself around, with quiet frustration visible at the corners of his mouth.

“Can you tell me where Schimme Prager lives? I have a ‘plett’¹ for him, I’m supposed to eat at his home for the Sabbath.”

“And why shouldn’t I know that?” the boy exclaimed, astonished. “He’s my father.”

The beggar hurriedly took several steps toward the boy.

“Is that really true, what you’re saying?” he asked, eagerly grabbing him by the hand. His voice was marked by inexpressible trembling.

“Who else should be my father?” the child asked.

It was clear that he was put off, the way spirited children often are when people ask uncomfortable questions about their parents.

“I’m sorry, I’m sorry,” the beggar continued with the same level of hurried excitement. “Isn’t your name Benjamin, my child, and don’t you have a sister named Rösele? Doesn’t she have beautiful black hair? And is she still so full of such infectious, heartfelt happiness? Does she still sing such magnificent songs, particularly on Friday evenings, when father comes home from the synagogue? You know, ‘Salem Alechem, Alechem Salem.’² And your mother, of course! Her name is Channe. Praised be God, is she still doing well and healthy? Does she still wear the black velvet hair covering and the gold ducat around her neck?”

Suddenly the beggar stopped, putting his hand over his mouth as if he had betrayed too much. He then said quietly, with a smile, “If you know, my child, where Reb Schimme Prager lives, take me there—so long as you’re willing.”

Benjamin—and this was in fact his name—was so astonished and agitated that he did not know what to make of the strange appearance of the beggar. Never had anyone inquired into his family circumstances in such an intimate and penetrating way. The boy could not respond.

Strangely, the beggar did not seem to be waiting for a response. Looking downward, but with a marvelous smile on his lips that became more beautiful and victorious the further they went, he walked alongside the boy through all the meanderings of the street, even through the dark passageways that were difficult to navigate without a guide. All of a sudden they stood before Reb Prager’s home, and the boy seemed to recall the enthusiasm with which he had left the rabbi’s house. He tore himself away from his companion with a powerful leap and went into the house. The beggar remained outside at the door. He did not dare enter.

“Didn’t I tell you,” he heard the boy call out, “that I would be able to read my first page of Talmud on Friday? I kept my word, mother, now it’s your turn.”

“Yes, yes, my child,” a female voice agreed, and hearing this voice turned the beggar pale. “Yes, yes, but not before father has had the chance to examine you on the page of Talmud. Nowadays, Benjamin, one has to be careful. But he’ll have pleasure enough when he gets home. Do you want an advance?”

To the beggar, who was eavesdropping, it seemed as if the mother had planted two tender kisses on the cheeks of her child before Benjamin could even answer. For several minutes this sweet exchange of giving and taking seemed to continue. The beggar felt powerful tremors raging through his veins and had to hold onto the door. He heard Benjamin telling his mother about meeting a “peculiar” beggar whom he had left outside.

At that point both mother and child stepped outside, and the beggar barely had time to jump to the side.

“God welcome you, guest,” the mother said. “Do you have a plett for me?”

Unable to speak, the beggar handed her his written assignment for the Sabbath meal. He was dumbfounded when, with a hand gesture, the mother refused the piece of paper and said, “How am I supposed to get by? I’m sorry. I have to send you back. I can’t keep you here. My Shabbes is already made, and I wasn’t counting on you.”³

“So I have to leave?” the beggar asked, trembling, his eyes fixed on the ground. “You don’t want to keep me here for the Sabbath?”

The mother, taken aback and overcome by the peculiar, painful tone of this exclamation, looked carefully at the beggar. She did not know what to make of his concern. But then she said, speaking from her magnificent heart, “Nu, nu, if you’re so interested in poor people’s food, then stay, my guest.⁴ On Shabbes you shouldn’t go hungry. God knows that Channe Prager doesn’t run a household where she feeds five mouths but can’t manage to feed a sixth.”

“Do you know what?” Benjamin said suddenly, “I’ll give our guest my portion of the fish!”

“Nu, do you see, guest?” the mother continued, smiling at the boy triumphantly. “Nu, do you see that you’ll have plenty to eat? Benjamin will give you his fish, and there will be a piece of barches for you as well.⁵ Come, you must stay. My son Elijah is far away from home. Do I know whether he’ll have a Shabbes dinner tonight? How could I have forgotten that? So please come, you won’t go hungry, I’ll make sure of it.”

Fortunately, at this very moment Reb Schimme Prager, the master of the house, came home, making it unnecessary for the beggar to respond or express his gratitude. The heavy pack on his back clearly identified him as a peddler. Benjamin flew over to him and exclaimed, “Welcome, father, welcome, father! Do you know that I can read my first page of Talmud?”

Before responding, Reb Schimme placed his hand on the holy place on the doorpost where “Shaddai,” the secret name of God, peered out through a little shining glass window. He then brought his hand reverently up to his lips. This made the entire figure of the peddler appear higher and mightier than it had seemed at first sight. It was as if proximity to God were elevating him above the load of his pack and above himself. His face was easier to make out, it was one of those countenances that only the ghetto knows: a furrowed brow marked by grief, trouble, and the difficulties of life. The beggar was startled deeply at this sight.

Walking on into the room, the peddler tossed off his pack like a giant caterpillar and finally said, “That’s what you say, Benjamin, my dear, but what does the world say about this? Nowadays it’s hard to put one over on people, and a page of Talmud isn’t easy.”

“So why don’t you test me?” Benjamin said with a pride that was easy to comprehend.

“Now that’s the way to talk,” the peddler said while nodding his head. “Since you’re so eager and ready, why don’t we go see our cousin Reb Jaikew tomorrow? What do you say? Let’s go to our pious cousin Reb Jaikew, and you’ll tell him, ‘Cousin, you must examine me. My father doesn’t believe that I can already read my first page of Talmud.’ And Benjamin dear, let me tell you, if you pass his test like a good boy should, then I’ll have a new jacket made for you, one befitting a nobleman. We’ll go to Reb Maier the cloth merchant, and you can pick out the fabric yourself.”

At this point, Channe came forward. The good mother that she was, she wanted her child to have the pleasure of greeting his father first. “Schimme,” she said with a trace of anger, “so what’s this? You don’t even greet your wife?”

The peddler smiled at her and reached out his hand. She was appeased. “What kind of a week did you have, Schimme?” she asked.

“I had a week like never before, Channe dear. I made some money, but the best thing was the pretty peasant woman, yes, the pretty peasant woman.” While saying this, the peddler smiled enigmatically.

“What’s with this peasant woman?” Channe spoke up, and the mother’s otherwise pale and dear face turned a beautiful red. But laughing, she continued, “Maybe you’re in love, Reb Schimme? That’s just what I need!”

“Maybe, maybe,” the peddler smiled, even more enigmatically.

“Your days are past, my dear Reb Schimme,” Channe said, shaking her shoulders. “You’re an old little apple, and a sour one too.”

“But I should live and be happy,” the father called back, laughing. “She’s giving me grief, but the peasant woman, my pretty peasant woman, I can’t stop thinking about her.”

The beggar kept his eyes fixed on husband and wife while this peculiar scene was going on. Now that it was over, he didn’t know where to look. But when Reb Schimme turned away from the mother and went on about his enigmatic “peasant woman,” he noticed the beggar standing at the door. “Salem Alechem,” he said, shaking his hand.

“Alechem Salem,” the beggar responded.

“Where do you come from?” the examination began.

“I—I come from Hungary.”

“What are you really? To me you don’t really look like a beggar. There’s something else about you.”

“Me?—I’m a teacher.”

“And you’re going begging like this? Don’t you have a father and a mother?

“Yes, they should both live to a hundred.”

“Let me ask you something foolish. What’s your father’s name?”

“My father’s name is . . . Reb Schimme. My mother’s name is . . . Channe!”

Husband and wife looked at each other with surprise. It seemed that the mother now had a whole series of questions for the beggar, yet at that moment, much to their horror, they heard the happy voice of the caretaker of the synagogue calling out that the Sabbath was about to begin. Channe remembered that she still had work to do in the kitchen and in the house; the lamp had not yet been filled, and Benjamin had not even twisted the wicks yet; the white tablecloths had not been set out either. And what about Reb Schimme? He was still wearing the peddler’s attire he wore during the rest of the week and he had not even shaved yet. The beggar excused himself. He had to tear himself away forcefully from the ground on which he, like Moses, was supposed to have stood with bare feet.⁶ As he passed by the mother working outside in the kitchen, she called after him that he should not have hard feelings, and that he should not forget to come later that day. She had grown to like him, this foreign and strange guest! Walking quickly, he left the house and went back to the “Schlafstube.”

An excerpt from a letter from Emanuel to Clara

Your teacher’s lessons have yielded far too little fruit, my dear Clara! Two hours in the ghetto have convinced me that you do not know Jews and Judaism at all! Why is this? I have never told you what it is all really about, the unfathomable, intangible perfume of the wine—I mean the spirit. There’s one thing you should think about, Clara. The world spirit that died on the cross with the blond Rabbi of Nazareth started off in a ghetto like this one. Indeed, I tell you, glimmers and buds are still alive today among its inhabitants! Two hours have convinced me of this . . .

I have already seen my parents, and neither of them recognized me. My little brother Benjamin is one of those late flowers of marital love that God sends those people whom he wants to ensu...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Copyright
• Title Page
• Series Editor
• Contents
• Introduction
• 1. Literature and the Invention of the Ghetto
• 2. Historical Fiction and the Sephardic Experience
• 3. Experiments in Jewish Realism
• 4. Fictions of Religious Renewal
• Sources
• Suggestions for Further Reading