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accent, although he still
and the good intentions of
converses with his parents
others don't quite match.
in Russian (and he's told
Other stories reveal gaps of
that he has a decent accent
understanding between the
in that language). When he
family and friends they left
writes dialogue, he says that
behind, and between mem-
he hears the lines in
bers of the larger family.
Russian, and then trans-
Bezmozgis, Gary
lates.
Shteyngart and Lara
Growing up, he was the
Vapnyar are a troika of
family's translator and since
young Russian-Jewish emi-
he was 10, he would write
gre fiction writers of consid-
letters for his father, a mas-
erable talent. They write of
David Bez mozgis:
sage
therapist like Roman
a sense of being between
"Drawn by the nos-
Berman.
The author
worlds, although each is
Id
Jews."
talgia for o
attended an Orthodox
quite different. Shteyngart is
Jewish day school for eight
the satirist of the group.
years and then a public high school.
Bezmozgis and Vapnyar, who has also
After graduating from McGill
published a collections of stories, are
more similar in their spare, understated University in Montreal, he received a
style, although most of Vapnyar's stories master of fine arts degree in film. He
worked in Los Angeles for five years as
are set in the former Soviet Union,
a documentary filmmaker before mov-
while Bezmozgis portrays one emigre
ing back to Toronto.
family, and through them, the larger
He admittedly has a poor memory,
community.
and finds that can be valuable. About
The three follow in a long, respected
Latvia, he remembers nothing. "It
line of Jewish writers who have cre-
atively mined their immigrant pasts - allows me not to be too deeply con-
nected to things. I can't be faithful to
and ethnic neighborhoods in fiction.
something I can't remember." In writ-
Writers like Philip Roth, Grace Paley,
ing he tries "to find the emotional
Isaac Bashevis Singer, Mordecai Richter
truth, not a documentary truth."
and Bernard Malamud come to mind.
Bezmozgis' success story began with
"It's a dream to be part of that tradi-
tion," B.ezmozgis says, although he feels him giving the tide story to a friend,
most akin, stylistically and thematically, who sent it to an editor at Farrar, Straus
& Giroux, who made a commitment
with writers like Isaac Babel and
to the book. He then lined up an agent
Leonard Michaels.
and before long the New Yorker,
He's most interested in people who
Harpers and Zoetrope ran his stories in
are originals, struggling, not yet middle
their pages.
class. Here, he writes of athletes, cab
When in New York, Bezmozgis read
drivers and a Moscow-trained dentist
the first story in the collection,
Who works as a maid for a Canadian
"Tapka," to a group of Russian emigre
dentist and uses his office to see her
and American Jews on the rooftop of a
own patients — Russian immigrants
Greenwich Village apartment at a
without insurance — late at night.
meeting sponsored by RAMCA, the
For the author, being Jewish is very
Russian American Civic A.sociation.
important. "I'm an atheist. I think that
"His stories are very evocative of
limits what kind of religious life I can
Russian-Jewish emigre experiences,
have without being a tourist or hyp-
whether in Toronto or New York.
ocrite. Being part of a community, at
These are stories we all went through,"
synagogue, gives me pleasure."
said Elana Broitman, the founder of
He adds, "You put me in a syna-
RAMCA. "It's very refreshing to hear."
gogue with old Eastern European Jews,
Brotiman, an attorney who does gov-
and I'm likely to break down in tears.
ernment
relations work, came to New
That is my idea of Jewish tradition and
York from Odessa in the mid-1970s.
my identity."
"What language do you think in?" a
He sounds like Mark Berman again.
Russian-accented man asks.
In "Minyan" Mark attends Shabbat
"In English," Bezmozgis responds,
services at the old-age home where his
grandfather lives. "Most of the old Jews and then says the same when asked in
which language he dreams.
came because they were drawn by the
"In rubles?" the man asks, and then
nostalgia for ancient cadences, I came
answers his own question. "Nobody
because I was drawn by the nostalgia
thinks or dreams in rubles. That's a
for old Jews. In each case, the motiva-
nightmare."
tion was not tradition but history."
Bezmozgis writes in English and his
spoken English has no trace of an

4(

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