Jolson, Judy, and Jewish memory

Judaism, Fall, 2001 by Irving Saposnik

Long Ago and Far Away

Eii, rumenye, rumenye...

Geven a mol a land a zise, a sheyne

Eii, rumenye, rumenye...

Geven a mol a land a zise, a fayne. (9)

Often ignoring the poverty and persecution they fled, the immigrant Jews sang of the old country, the Yiddishland which seemed to take on a romantic glow commensurate with the difficulties they faced in adjusting to America. Perhaps more of a realist than many, Aaron Lebedeff would begin his singing of "Rumenye" by reminding his listeners that he was taking them back to a time that was but no longer is. For many, however, the memories of the old country were timeless, necessary antidotes to the confusion wrought by "America gonif." On stage, occasionally on screen, often on records, and increasingly at home, these songs were sung and played so that they became the popular expression of a collective nostalgia.

In many of these songs, Eastern Europe is re-created as a lost paradise, the earthly equivalent of a biblical Eden, where life and learning continues unimpeded by the outside world. Perhaps the most famous of these songs, and the most typical, is "Mayn Shtetle Belz," written by Alexander Olshenetsky and Jacob Jacobs for the 1932 musical GetoLid. In the musicalized Belz, Spring springs eternal, childhood is recalled as playful laughter, sweet dreams and idyllic Sabbath strolls along the riverbank. Words and music reinforce an idealized Judaism, detached from the turbulent world that threatened its survival. On a New York stage, before a New York audience, the Yiddish actor sings of a romanticized past, a pastoral landscape of shtetl mythology that contrasts with the urban reality of the street.

Shtetl and street form the intersection of the Yiddish dream; the heart longing for an imaginary Eastern Europe, the body trapped in an all-too-concrete East Side. As the glow of the Golden Land dimmed, the contrast with songs written from the other side of the Atlantic, like Sholem Aleichem's "Shlof, Mayn Kind," was both inescapable and poignant: "Your father is in America--a wondrous place, a paradise for Jews where everyone is happy and khale is eaten, even on weekdays. When we get there, I will cook broth for you." But in America, the broth turned bitter. Even Sholem Aleichem changed his tune when he crossed the ocean. His final chapters of "Mattel in America," written when he was living in the Bronx, depict a different America than Mattel had anticipated, and his dramatization of the Tevye stories for the New York Yiddish stage focused on Chava, whose story of intermarriage was a cautionary tale for an American audience.

As physical distance became the norm, Sholem Aleichem's musical mother was destined to be left behind not only by her husband but by her child. Cradle songs were transformed into songs of separation, songs like "A Brivele Der Mamen, "in which a mother laments: "Dos akhte yor, ikh bin aleyn/Dos kind iz vayt farshoumen/Dos kinder harts is hart vi a shteyn/Keyn eyntsik briv bakumen./"("Eight years now, I've been alone/My child has wandered faraway/His childish heartis hard as stone/I've not received a single letter./") Eventually expiring in her grief, the mother addresses her wayward son from the grave, admonishing him to say kaddish after her so that at least her eternity may be peaceful.