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Dr. Salo Baron's 'The Russian Jew,' Slonim.* 'Soviet Literature"
on Status of USSR Jewry
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Ehrenburg's 'Memoirs' Throw New Light

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ing that some gentleman will was as a comment on this, two
Russian Jewry's tragic position, sian Jewry and numerous related ing "many cliche-ridden portraits
years later, that Ehrenburg, who
throw him a copper. Tuwim
dicta- factors are covered here in full, of Russian soldiers and intellec-
also wrote at length about the
wants to throw his heart to him,
under tsars and Communist
tors, has been and remains a long- and the history of Russian Jewry tuals," but there is no reference
m
Speam
niosih
rs• Civil war, stated in his
h him and sing with him
g
in world reads like a great adventure to the expurgations told in Dr.
t he
so it of
ng sorrow under oth er
o
continuing phenomenon
The Jewish population in marked by struggle to retain the Baron's book.
ple's windows..."But there
people's
history.
"The tragedy of France had
Slonim does, however, speak
Russia had risen, under the tsars, people's heritage.
is no refuge in the world of
begun long before: as early as
about the conditions that af-
-
Dr. Baron then presents a re
men for Jewish wanderers with
1936 when Leon Blum, in .fear
to more than 7,000,000. It is
fected Ehrenburg's status under
approximately •3,000,000 now. Jews view of conditions under the So -
a wild song."
of the right-wing, had refused
Stalinism,
and
he
states:
"Ehren-
have p 1 a y e d important roles viets and the sufferings u n d e r
Preceding this tribute there is
to sell arms to the Spanish goo
burg is hardly responsible for
Russia,
but
for
much
more
than
Stalinism,
the
restrictions
that
still
in
Ehrenburg:
by
ernment. This was contrary
this comment
the exaggerations and lies of
century, pogroms. persecutions remain as a continuation of that
"Heine wrote: 'When I die they
both to existing agreements - and
this anti - European and anti -
on all fronts, marred their lives. v,policy, are presented factually.
will cut my tongue out of my
to the interests of France, to
American campaign of 1948-52.
say nothing of Blum's political
Many books have appeared in ® The Nazi extermination policy a He had enough common sense dead body.' The books of the poet
Germany,
who brought fame to
outlook. The Socialist premier
recent years describing Russian introduced in the last reversed
to draw the line between an in -
poetry,
who
enriched
her
lyrical
Jewry's status. Several new vol- brief trend of rejuvenation in So-
admired Stendahl• in his novels
dictment of capitalism and the
hundred
years
later
times add to an understanding of viet Jewish life, and Dr. Baron
were.
burnt
a
he liked characters with strong
outright condemnation of West -
-
conditions
under
which
our
points
out
that
after
the
"black
passions; he himself had no
the
e rn culture; he had, on several in bonfires in his native `Oussel
high dorf' — the racialists could not
i
will power. He cried: 'It breaks
kinsmen live under Communist years" of the Stalinist terror "there
occasions, defended its
-
seemed,
indeed,
to
be
little
hope
1
achievements and warned against forgive the author of "Winter
my heart,' and then talked
rule.
about 'non - intervention.' What
chauvinistic smugness. . He was maerchen' for being a Jew. When
Dr. Salo W. Baron, professor for any Jewish survival; certainly
based
-
for
any
meaningful
survival
I
was
in
Poland
in
1928,
anti
-
-
even criticized by the intransi
broke was not his heart but
emeritus of .Jewish history and lit
re-
University,
upon
the
cultivation
of
one's
gents
for
his
'complacency.'
But
Semites
persecuted
Tuwim:
he
erattire at Columbia
shrewd and cautious as he was, showed me a newspaper where it
offers a graphic account in "The ligio - cultural heritage."
cabled report
was said that his poetry 'smelt of . And in 1939, in a
Yet, he indicates, as a result
he never disregarded danger sig -
Russian Jew Under Tsars and So -
to his paper, Izvestia, he wrote
viets." published by Macmillan of the correction of some of the
nals and he navigated warily in garlic."
about "Bonnet's and Laval's sly
from Tuwim's
(60 Fifth, N.Y. 11). It is "corn- Stalinist errors, , "even now there
Ehrenburg
quotes
storm waters. For instance,
Polish
Jews," the deeply moves, Blum's cowardly bleating,
— the
when some of his friends who "we
prehensive history from the earli- is less anti-Jewish discrimination
moving repudiation of anti-Semi- Daladier's stupid parochial policy,"
est settlements to the present in the basic fields of Soviet sci-
were Jewish writers and artists,
which Tuwim had written: This is not the opinion French
reviews the heroic ence and technology, especially
- time, - and it
were dragged before the firing tism in
history records about Blum's cour-
squad in the '50s, heprefrred
and the sad occurrences in the his- nuclear physics and space ex-
"I hear voices: Very well. But age under the Nazis. Perhaps fol-
tory of a people that has made ploration." While he admits that
not to open his mouth and care-
Pole, why do you write low - up Ehrehburg memoirs will
fi e are
great contributions to Jewish life such a prognosis "may turn out
a
fully remained in the back- if you
Jews"?'
I reply: Because
and has helped develop the State to be overoptimistic," that "we
ground."
of my blood."Then it is racial- amend these views.
Ehrenburg recalls the Hasidic
need but remember the tremen-
of Israel.
Boris Pasternak's role as "the ism?' Nothing of the kind. On the
he told in his Lazik narra-
dous eruption of irrational forces
While "Soviet Russian Litera -
voice of the other Russia" is an- contrary. There are two kinds of , stories
ture—Writers and Problems" by into all human affairs in our
other interesting chapter in which blood: the blood that flows in the tive.
He recalls Isaac Babel's works,
Marc Slonim, published by Oxford generation. Yet we must not
his father is mentioned as the pro - , veins and the blood that flows out
arrest,
University Press (417 Fifth, N. Y. overlook the very basic assump-
fessor in the School of Painting, of them. The first is the sap of Babel's experiences, his
16), deals strictly with literature, lion of both American de-
Sculpture and Architecture and his tie body, to study it is the busi- their kinship in the Common
there are comments there that re- mocracy and Russia's materialis-
mother. the gifted pianist, as the ness of the physiologist. Those , search for beauty, love, art. It
tic conception of history, name-
late to the Jewish issue.
pupil of Anton Rubinstein. Later, who ascribe to this blood any kind was in 1954, that the prosecutor
ly, that in any long historic
In many respects the most im-
in a chapter on "The Unstable of properties other than physio- , informed Ehrenburg of the "post-
portant of the newest book on process reason must ultimately
Equilibrium," Slomin describes the logical ones are those who, as we humous rehabilitation of Isaak
Russian Jewry is Ilya Ehrenburg's prevail."
uproar about Pasternak when he have seen, reduce towns to ruins, Emmainulovich Babel."
"Memoirs: 19214941." published
Dr. Baron devotes considerable received the Nobel Prize in Litera- kill millions of human beings, and
Towards the end of the me
by World. It is a revealing work space to comments on Jews in the tore for "Zhivago."
in the end, doom their own people moirs there are a number of
that could well be used as proof Russian literary sphere, and be-
A number of the victims of the to destruction. The other kind of
biographical sketches of noted
that the post-Stalin era under cause we are concerned here speci- anti-Jewish Stalinist campaign are blood is that which the leader of
writers, and several of them
Khrushchev brought a measure of fically with Ilya Ehrenburg as well li sted,and the evidence thus ac - international fascism pumps out
had the same experience — they
prove
the,
freedom to the literary folk in as with other noted Jewish names cumulates of the terror that existed of humanity in order to
were caught in the purge and
in literature, this quotation from under Stalin.
superiority of his blood over mine
Russia.
posthumously rehabilitated. So
* * *
the blood of millions of
"The Russian Jew" is worth cull-
many of them were Jews! And
over
Ilya Ehrenburg's "Memoirs: 1921- people
tortured
to
death
.
.
.
The
As history. Dr. Baron's "The ing:
• Ehrenburg was able to tell the
1941" offers amazing evidence of
"A most accomplished artist of the apparent change in the bril- blood of Jews (not 'Jewish blood')
Russian Jew" is superb. Published
truth about them—thus indicat-
part of the Macmillan Russian these salti mortali has been Ilya liant writer's attitude on Jewish flows in deep, broad streams, the
as pa
ing the changes that were insti-
in
a
Civilization Series, the eminent Ehrenburg. His return to Jewish matters, referred to in Baron's 'The dark streams flow together
toted after Stalin!
n
Ehrenburg's
is
a
turbulent,
foaming
river,
and
i
scholar's account interests during the Second World Russian Jew."
In another sense, Ehrenburg's
this new Jordan I accept holy bap-
of the Russian War inspired many descriptions in revealing account
memoirs become part of the liter-
-
bloody
burning
brother
Burin
the
—
tism
Jewish story the first draft of his novel,
of what seemed
hood in martydom of the Jews . . . ature about the holocaust: he ex-
commences with (The Storm. But sensing the like a regained
We, Shloims, Sruls, Moishkes, poses so many of the crimes of
the earliest set- changed attitude of the literary freedom of ac-
dirty, garlicky, we with our endless the Nazis committed in France,
zhdanov- tion after Khru-
dements, during dictators during the
have during his residence in Paris, and
nicknames, we
insulting
the Khazar Em - shchina (the Zhdanov era), Ehren- shchev. The earl-
proved ourselves the peers of later when he was in Germany
pire, and in Kie- burg burned his original manu- ier story of this
Achilles, of Richard Cour de Lion and was eye-witness to the Nazi
van Russia in the script and expurgated most pro- leader among the
and other heroes. In the cata- manipulations.
10th Century.
Jewish statements when the novel Russian men of
combs and bunkers of Warsaw, in
Ernest Toiler, the German Jew
In the 1 5th finally appeared and secured the
gave
letters
the stinking sewers we amazed our ish author and communist who
Century there al - Stalin Prize in 1948. But it evident-
Baron
proof
that
he
had
neighbors,
the rats. We with committed suicide; Josef Roth and
ready was in evidence the xenopho - ly was this extreme pliability been silent under
rifles on the barricades, we, below a number of other literary fig-
Pia of the Russian masses and their which saved his life during the Stalin. The pros-
Ehrenburg
planes that bombed our wretched ures play important roles in the
rulers. the dislike of the Jews who Stalin terror."
eat volume of memoirs, written dwellings,
g, we arose as soldiers of Ehrenburg recollections. T h e r e
differed from them. Under Em-
Dr. Baron lists a number of the and published under Khrushchev,
press. Catherine, Jews were wel- outstanding Jewish wri ters, Alex- was done in a period of rebirth, freedom and honor. `Aronchik,
Pascin —Julius
—"a
Modigliani."
Sephardic
Jew like Pinchas
corned as "burghers." Later, the ander I. Bezymenskii, Eduard G. of Ehrenburg's renewed interest why are 7ou not at the front?' was
, honored
matter involving separation of Bagritskii, Ossip E. Mandelshtam
glorified
Iran
the
Stalin
was
still
,
of
his
very
evident
feel-
in Jews,
Jews into kahals raised issues af- Mikhail Golodnii " d par ti culerl y ing of freedom to be able to ex- sirs, and he died for Poland . . ." when Ehrenburg first met in
feeling their status.
-"Th
•"The
e words," Ehrenburg adds 1936. It is too early in the 1921-
Boris P a s t e r n a k who, though
himself as freely as he does
as his personal comment, "writ- 1941 memoirs to get a correct
It was under Nicholas I and reared in a cultured Zionist home in some matters.
ten in blood—`tat flows
out by
of evaluation of Ehrenburg's feelings
Alexander II that impatience was of a famous painter friend of Leo
copied
We have no evidence in Ehren-
the veins' — were
about the man who became a vio-
shown with JeWish resistance to Tolstoy, Rainer Maria Rilke and
Jewish
Chaim
Weizmann,
gradually
drifted
burg's
writings
about
expurgations
thousands of people."
conversions. Abolition of
lent anti - Semite.
in "The Storm." There is a pass-
-
autonomy then began to be props spiritually into the world of both ing mention of the novel. But
Ehrenburg exposes not ,only
Ehrenburg's memoirs — excel-
Blood Accusations were in- Russian populism and Russian- there are other comments that
gated. B
the Hitler myth but also Mus-
lently translated by Tatania She-
traduced and condoned and the Orthodox mysticism."
solini's. He tells about the writ-
are most meritorious.
bunia in collaboration w i t h
Cantonist excesses, the use of
The Ehrenburg memoirs throw
er Celine who, in 1938, in Mar-
makes many references to Yvonne Kapp — deal at length
He
knappers (kidnappers) to seize much light on some of the Jewish
seines, "suggested joining Hitler
-
Jewish youth for 25-year services names in literature and reveal a Jewish heroes in the novels under with the abortive Austrian "Au
in a crusade against 'the Jews
consideration, and the experiences sehluss," with his experiences in
in the Russian army—with the ac- great deal more about Ehrenburg
and the Kalmuks' (by Kalmuks
of some of the Jewish writers France prior to the entrance of
eompanying aim of converting himself.
he meant the Russians."
described here are of great in- the Nazis and during the initial
them—marked the continuation of
* * *
terest.
Then came the period when
periods of occupation. They were
policies of extreme discrimination.
Marc Slonim's "Soviet Russian
A most touching account is
trying months, were marked by signs went up in France announc-
Mass emigration commenced, Literature" assesses the Russian
Mass
given of Julian Tuwim, his love
being arrested in spite of the i ng "Aryan firm. No Jews ad-
and Dr. Baron points out that in
literary scene and comments on for the Russian people arr41 for Soviet-Hitler pact. He had diffi- mitted."
the 1920s many a Jewish lands-
the leading writers, including Isaac
Russian poetry, his "poem about
The war was On. The Jewish
cult y also convincing .his people
manshaft in New York City "ex-
Babel, Ilya Ehrenburg and scores
a Jewish beggar - boy who sings a
upon his return to Moscow that Anti-Fascist Committee came into
ceeded in size the total popula-
of others.
sad little song in the street hop - Hitler was not to be trusted.
being. The aftermath is yet to be
tion of the town from which its
The chapter devoted to Babel,
His opinion of Leon Blum is told. -But there is enough evidence,
members had stemmed."
"the romantic storyteller," as Slo-
not complimentary. He relates in the biographical sketches, in
The migrations, communal au- nim describes him, describes his
how "in February 1936 the Camel - some of the artists' experienced
tonomy, political stirrings which "tales about Jewish toughs and ec-
ots du Roi (an extreme right-wing tragedies, to indicate what was
affected Jewry, the development of centrics of Odessa." Experiences
organization) .attacked Leon Blum, then in store for Jews in Russia.
Zionism, the economic struggles in the Jewish Pale of Settlement
beat him up', and, for some un - Ehrenburg courageously narrates
are evaluated as part of the story are reviewed and several of the
accountable reason, kept his hat the story. His next volume of me-
of Jewry under tzarism.
Jewish themes are reviewed.
and tie as trophies." That same moirs undoubtedly will be even
Cultural progress, the literary
Then there is an interesting crit-
the announcement more revealing — provided that
year came
renaissance that distinguished Rus- ical account of Eln- enburg's works.
that Blum had proclaimed the Khrushchev's successors are not
Here, too, the Jewish background
,
'
principle of non-intervention in resurrected Stalinists.
of the writer is referred to. "The
S.
— P.
THE DETROIT JEWISH NEWS
Spain, with Britain's support. It
Storm" is mentioned as contain-
56—Friday, October 30, 1964

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