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Gone With
Myth
The dashing "Ashley
had . one Jewish parent.
Elizabeth Applebaum
AppleTree Editor
C-1644 /1916-
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Editor's Note: Some time ago this
column identified actor Leslie
Howard (best known as Ashley •
Wilkes in Gone With the Wind) as
Jewish. Jewish News reader Bobbie
Berkowitz wrote with a concern:
She was a longtime correspondent
of the actor's son, Ronald [who
recently died], who wrote in a letter
to her that Mr. Howard's mother
was not Jewish. Apparently; Leslie's
mother had little interest in any reli-
gion, though Ronald identified his
maternal grandmother, Mary Parkin-
son, as a Quaker. Yet for years,
books on celebrities have said Leslie
Howard was Jewish. Ms. Berkowitz
asked us to get to the truth.
Done. John Torvik of England,
who is writing a biography of
Howard called Pimpernel Smith,
explained in a recent interview that
Leslie Howard's father was Jewish;
his mother was not. "Tell Me Why"
stands corrected. Following is the
interview with Torvik.
What can you tell us about Mr.
Howard's father?
Leslie's relationship with his father
was far from cordial and there was
never, I'm afraid, much sympathy
between them. Frank Stainer [born
Steiner] was Hungarian, an emigre
3/12
1999
80 Detroit Jewish News
Leslie °ward's biographer
clears up the mystery about
the actor's Jewish roots.
and a Jew. At a time when chauvin-
ism was running high in English
society, these were all very dis-
abling attributes, at least, socially.
He was a stockbroker, middling,
probably not atypical or less anx-
ious than other Jews similarly gentri-
fied. What is certain is that his own
faith did not rear largely in the
upbringing of his children.
Did Leslie Howard ever identify
as Jewish?
Only as it affected his perception
of himself as a foreigner, I think. He
was the first born of his siblings; his
family decamped to Vienna soon
after his birth. It makes more sense
of Leslie's own later remarks in life,
which, otherwise, sound exaggerat-
ed, that he "began life as a Hun-
garian" — for he made no ostensi-
ble effort to deny his origins.
As a child, was he involved in
any way with Judaism, however
remotely?
YoU have to understand the pre-
tensions of Anglo-Jewry at this time.
Only in the impoverished East End,
really, was Judaism still a vital force
for the emigre. Rising middle-class
burghers like Frank Stainer, having
"arrived," were anxious to be
assimilated; in their gentrification
they aspired, above all things, to
be "English," and it had been this
,,±1 \
way ever since Isaac Disraeli bap-
tized his son [the future British prime
minister], Benjamin, in the Church
of England. It was no disparage-
ment to their faith that they did so,
merely it was a pragmatic snob-
bery, if you will.
,
How would you describe Leslie
Howard's religious interests as an
adult?
A mystic, really, if anything. In prac-
tice, he was virtually an agnostic,
very casual in his religious obser-
vances and not overtly or very much
disposed toward any formal worship.
What about the rise to power of
Adolf Hitler? Leslie Howard was a
military hero. Do you believe his
decision to fight in the war was in
any way influenced by his Jewish
heritage?
I believe that Leslie's heritage was
not inconsiderably the most significant
alloy of his personality in conditioning
his revulsion towards the Nazis. Cer-
tainly their own animus was drawn
from the fact, as [Leslie's son] Ronald
himself suggests, that Leslie was half-
Jewish. Striking home as it did at
Leslie's own Jewishness, Nazism
affronted him — no less than the risks
it posed for those civilized conventions
of fair play and decency that made
England, in the end, more precious
by far than his own safety. H