This passage fully characterizes Dick's activity, which lasted from the fifties until his death, in 1893. He was not a man of deep learning, and did not produce any masterpieces, such as the other writers of the time were printing in the South. But he atoned for this by his great earnestness and good common sense, which led him to choose the best subjects for his stories, such as would be of the most immediate good for his humble readers. He translated or imitated the leading popular books of his time, not limiting himself to such as were taken out of Jewish life, but independently of their religious tenor. Among his translations we find the works of Bernstein, Campe, Beecher-Stowe; there are imitations of Danish, French, Polish, and Russian books; and many subjects, not easily traceable now, have been suggested to him by other literatures. He has also written many stories taken from the life of the Lithuanian Jews. He ascribes great importance to biographies, devoting several introductions to impress the necessity of reading these. But he treats just as frequently geographical and historical themes; among the latter he has even dared to give an impartial discussion of the Reformation.
At first Dick's books were small 16mos of rarely more than forty-eight pages, and up to the year 1871 the abbreviation AMD, for his name, occurs but twice. After that all his works bear the initials, or even the name in full. The small size of the books is due to his desire to make them accessible to the poorest of his race; this necessitated a retrenchment of nearly all the works which he translated. Only in the eighties, when reading had become universal and more expensive works could be published, did he issue octavos of considerable thickness, some of them being four-volumed books. Dick had no talent as a writer, and his style is but a weak reflection of the originals which he translated. The language he uses is a frightful mixture of Judeo-German with German, the latter frequently predominating over the first, so that he is often obliged to give in parentheses the explanation of unusual words. And so it happened that, although his purpose had been a good one, and his influence had at first been salutary on a very large circle of readers, he has set a bad example to a large host of scribblers who have taken all imaginable liberties with the language and the subjects they treated of, and have produced a flood of bastard literature under which the many better productions are entirely drowned. He has destroyed all feeling for a proper diction, and has cultivated only a passion for reading, so that it was necessary for his followers to write 'ein höchst interessanter Roman' on the title-page, and parade the book with crumbs of German words unintelligible to the public, in order to find a ready sale.
One of the first to write in the style of Dick was M. R. Schaikewitsch,[93] who began his prolific career in 1876, since which time he has brought out more than one hundred books, the most of which are of bulky proportions. At first he was satisfied to tell stories from the life of his immediate surroundings, but soon he aspired to higher things, and began to drag in by the hair scenes and situations of which he did not have the slightest conception. As long as he wrote of what he had himself seen he produced books that, without doing any particular good, were to a certain extent harmless. He certainly has a better talent for telling a story than Dick; his language is also nearer the spoken vernacular, and in the beginning he avoided Germanisms. He might, therefore, have developed into one of the best Jargonists, had he chosen to study, and had he worked less rapidly. In an adaptation of Gogol's 'The Inspector,' he has shown what he might have been had he had any earnest purpose in life. But he lacks entirely Dick's straightforwardness, and writes only to make money. The common people devoured his stories with the same zeal that formerly they showed towards the productions of Dick, and unwittingly they have imbibed a poison which the later authors of a nobler nature, who have the interests of the people at heart, are trying to eradicate. These try to point out directly by accusation, and indirectly by writing better novels, how dangerous and immoral Schaikewitsch is in his books. They go too far in their anxiety to bias the mind of the masses against him when they speak of his proneness to immoral scenes, for in that he is not worse than many of the better class of authors. The deleterious effect is produced not by these, but by his introducing a world to them that does not exist in reality, that gives them a most perverted idea of life, without teaching them any facts worth knowing. In his many historical novels, for example, he uses good sources for the fundamental facts on which he bases his tale, but the men and women are such as could never have existed at the period described and that do not exist now: they are monstrosities of his imagination as they appear to him in his very narrow sphere of experiences. His treatment of these historical themes is not unlike the one given to the stories of Alexander and other ancient works during the Middle Ages. The resemblance is still further increased by his extravagant, romantic conception of love, on which he dwells with special pleasure, to the great joy of his feminine public.
A much better attempt at transferring the method of Dick to dramatic productions had been made as early as 1867 and the following year by J. B. Falkowitsch. His two dramas 'Chaimel the Rich' and 'Rochele the Singer' were at one time very popular in the South. The second is an adaptation of some foreign work; the first is probably original. They are written in a good vernacular, but are devoid of interest, as the didactic element outweighs the plot, and the latter is very loosely developed. Schaikewitsch has had many imitators, all of whom try to rival him in quantity. Among these are to be counted Blaustein, Beckermann, Seiffert, Budson, Buchbinder; the latter, a writer without talent, has at least given some useful translations, and has also written some articles on the popular belief of the Jews. Outside of Dick, the Northwest has produced two important writers, one in the beginning, the other at the end, of the period. The first is Zweifel, whom we already know from his poetical works; the other is Schatzkes, the author of 'The Jewish Ante-Passover.' Zweifel has produced several small works of aphorisms which have been very popular and have been frequently reprinted. Their fine moral tone, the purity of the language used in them, the simple style in which they are composed, place them among the best books of Judeo-German literature. He has also written a story, 'The Happy Reader of the Haphtora,' which is a discussion on piety and honesty clad in the form of a tale. The other, M. A. Schatzkes, has written but one book, which is not properly called a story, but an invaluable cyclopedia of Jewish customs, particularly such as directly or indirectly refer to the Passover, strung together in chronological order as a consecutive action. With the exception of Linetzki's 'The Polish Boy,' there has been written no one work that treats so comprehensively of the beliefs and habits of the Jews in Russia. Schatzkes is an indifferent story-teller, and his work is full of repetitions, but, nevertheless, 'The Jewish Ante-Passover' must be counted among the classics of the period under discussion. It is a sad picture that is portrayed in it; in a straightforward manner, without exaggeration, he tells of conditions that one would hardly believe possible as existing at the end of the nineteenth century.
Neither of these men has told stories in the manner of the Southern writers, for neither of them cared as much for the form as for the contents in which they told them. They differ from Dick in that they at least did not use a corrupt language in their works. All the other writers have no excuse for writing at all. This inferior literature had its rise in the seventies, when the better forces had been alienated from the people and had received instruction in Russian schools. The men who had been writing for the Haskala, finding their efforts crowned with success, had ceased to write; many of the older men had passed away. The newer generation had no reason to proceed in the path of the older men. There were only the lower classes left, who had had no advantages in the foreign education, and who were craving for reading matter of whatsoever kind. It was to these alone that the newer writers spoke, and they were not animated by any high motives in addressing them. They were left to themselves to do as they pleased, for the seventies are characterized by an absence of all criticism. No one cared what they did or how they did it. All felt and hoped that the last hour for the Jargon had come, and it was immaterial to them what was produced in Judeo-German literature before its final decay. But Abramowitsch's prophecy in 'The Dobbin' was fulfilled,—the assimilation that had been going on peacefully had not produced the desired result, and one morning those who had had time to forget the language their mothers had been talking to them awoke to the bitter consciousness that they were despised Jews, on the same level with the most lowly of their race. Among these arose a new school of writers who introduced the methods of the literary languages into their native dialect. The next period, the present, is signalized by a spirit of sound criticism.
IN the short period of two years Judeo-German literature lost four of its most prominent writers: in 1891 there passed away the veteran poet, Michel Gordon; the next year J. L. Gordon followed him; and soon after death gathered in Dick and Zederbaum. Without having himself produced any works of a permanent value, without having in any way accelerated or retarded the course of its literature, Zederbaum is peculiarly identified with its development and has on two important occasions in the history of the Jews of Russia served as a crystallizing body for the literary forces in the vernacular. He was born in 1816, and in his youth enjoyed the intimate friendship of Ettinger and Aksenfeld. He had fostered the budding talents of Abramowitsch and Linetzki at a time when the efforts of the first disciples of the Haskala were about to be crowned by a success they had hardly dreamed would be realized so soon. And he lived to see all his hopes crushed in the occurrences of 1881, when his race was threatened to be cast back into darkness more dense than at his birth. During a lifetime thus rich in momentous experiences, he has in his person reflected the succession of events as far as they affected his race. In 1861 he founded a Hebrew periodical, the Hameliz, as a mouthpiece of the more advanced ideas of culture for that restricted class of the learned and educated who still clung to the sacred language as the only medium for the advancement of worldly knowledge. But he felt that the time had come when the masses who, on the one side, could not be reached by that ancient tongue, and who, on the other, had not yet had an opportunity of a Russian instruction, must be approached directly in their own mother-tongue. So, two years later, he started the Judeo-German supplement to his Hebrew weekly, the Kol-mewasser, which was for ten years the rallying ground of all who could wield a Judeo-German pen. Then the Government interfered in the publication, and for another decade there was no periodical published in Russia in that language. Nor was that to be regretted, for its usefulness had become very small. The Russian schools were crowded with Jewish young men and women, and there was not a science or an art to which the Jews had not given a large contingent, and this vanguard of the new culture, even if it had not broken with the traditions of the past, could be reached only by means of the Russian language. To fall in line with these changed conditions, Zederbaum founded two Russian periodicals for the discussion of Jewish affairs.
After a great deal of trouble, he succeeded in October of 1881 in getting the Government's permission to issue a Judeo-German weekly, the Jüdisches Volksblatt. He felt that his duty was once more with the masses, that they needed the advice of better-informed men in the impending danger, and at the advanced age of sixty-five he once more took upon his shoulders a publication in which he had no supporters. In the first two years the weekly was bare of literary productions. Except for an occasional poem by J. L. Gordon, and here and there a feuilleton, the rest was occupied by political news, for which Zederbaum had to supply the leaders. Abramowitsch and Linetzki had ceased writing, and no new generation had had time to develop literary talents. The tone of the new novel, to do any positive good, had to be different from those current before. Dick had been writing for the people with little regard to the people's familiarity with the scenes described, while Abramowitsch wrote of the people but not necessarily to the level of an humble audience. Now the author had to write both of and for the people, he had to be in touch with them not as a critic or moralizer, but as a sympathetic friend. In 1883, two such men made their debut in the Jüdisches Volksblatt: Mordechai Spektor, the calm observer of the life in the lower strata of society, and Solomon Rabinowitsch, the impulsive painter of scenes from the middle classes. Of these, the first came nearest to what Zederbaum regarded as requisite for a writer in those troublous times, and he called Spektor to St. Petersburg to take charge of the literary part of his weekly.
In the short time of his connection with the Volksblatt, and later as editor of several periodicals of his own, Spektor[94] has developed a great activity. He has written a large number of short sketches and more extended novels,[95] and his talent is still in the ascendant. All of his productions are characterized by the same melancholy dignity and even tenor. He is never in a hurry with his narration, and his characters are sketched with a firm hand and clearly outlined against the background of the story. He loves his subjects with a calm, dispassionate love, and he loves the meanest of his creations no less than his heroes. He likes to dwell with them and to inspect them from every coign of vantage. He fondly tells of their good qualities and suffers with them for their natural defects. And yet, though he loves them, he does not place a halo around them, he does not idealize them. The situations are developed in his stories naturally, independently of what he would like them to be.
Although he now and then describes the life of the middle classes, he more often treats incidents from the life of the artisans in the small towns, who have not been affected by the modern culture. Himself having had few advantages in life, he has been able to keep in closer touch with the men and women about whom and for whom he writes. He understands them thoroughly, and they like to listen to him. He does not sermonize to them, he does not attack them or their enemies; he merely speaks to them as their friend. The Khassid and the Anti-Khassid, the laborer and the man of culture, Jew and Non-Jew, can read him with equal pleasure. The student of manners finds in his faithful pictures as rich a store of information as in Schatzkes' or Linetzki's works, and he has the conviction that nothing is distorted or thrown out of its proper proportion, as the others sometimes have to do in order to strengthen their arguments. Spektor is a young man, having been born in 1859, and was a witness of the occurrences in the seventies and the eighties from which he draws the subjects for his stories. His style is simple, without any attempts at adornment, and his language, based on his native dialect of Uman in the Government of Kiev, is chaste and pure.
One of the most puzzling problems to the Judeo-German writers of modern times has been the treatment of love in the Jewish novel. They all agree that they have to follow Western models in that class of literature, and they are all equally sure that that passion does not exist among their people in any of the phases with which one meets elsewhere. The young woman's education in a Jewish home is such as to exclude a blind self-abandonment, with the consequent tragic results. Her desire to form family ties is greater than the natural promptings of her heart; her infatuation of the moment is easily smothered by a cool calculation of her future welfare, by the consideration of her duties towards her future husband and children. Unless the author uses the greatest caution in this matter, he is liable to fall into exaggerations and sentimentalities which would soon land him among the writers of the type of Schaikewitsch. But Spektor, not departing even in this from his usual candor, intermingles the most romantic passages with the cold facts of stern reality. His unrequited lovers do not commit suicide, or pine their lives away; they get over their infatuations in a manner prescribed by their religious convictions, get married to others, and rear happy families. Here is an example:
In 'The Fashionable Shoemaker' we are introduced to the sphere of a well-to-do shoemaker with no pretensions to any kind of culture. Having gotten on successfully in life, he is anxious to marry his daughter Breindele to Schlōme, the dandyish son of Sender Liebersohn, the rich man of the town. The latter looks favorably on the alliance in spite of the general disinclination of business men to enter into family ties with artisans, as he is desirous of feathering his son's nest before an impending bankruptcy sweeps away his fortune. Lipsche, Breindele's mother, in vain tries to dissuade her husband from the step, while Hirschel, the chief apprentice in the shop, is earnestly pleading with Breindele to marry him, for he loves her dearly. But she is too much attracted by the wealth of Schlōme and her future social position to listen to her father's simple-hearted, honest workman. The marriage is consummated, and soon a complete change takes place in the affairs of all concerned. Liebersohn loses his possessions. Hirschel, bearing in his heart his unrequited love, leaves his master and establishes a shop of his own. He works with great energy to forget his sorrow, and becomes a dangerous competitor of Susje, the shoemaker, whose hard-earned savings are slowly disappearing under the double obligation to support his family and that of his daughter Breindele. In vain some of the 'modern' girls of the town dress themselves in their best gowns and don fine silk stockings when Hirschel comes to take a measure of their feet for new pairs of shoes for them. Their machinations have no effect on Hirschel, who lives quietly for himself. But one day he notices Leotschke, Breindele's younger sister, in the street, and he is struck by her resemblance to his former love. When he left his master she was but a child, and now she is a pretty maiden. He cultivates her acquaintance, falls in love with her and is loved by her. There are no love scenes in the story. Hirschel goes to Leotschke's mother and gets her willing consent to the union. After the marriage he helps support Breindele and her family, for her husband, Schlōme, who has learned no trade, finds it hard to make a living.
One of his best sketches is the one entitled 'Two Companions.' It is a gem among the many good things he has written,—perfect in form and rounded off as few of his sketches are. It tells of two girls, Rōsele and Perele, who have grown up together as dear friends. When they reach the age of sixteen Rōsele notices that the young students of the gymnasium pay more attention to her beautiful companion than to her. She becomes jealous, suspects the seamstress of purposely favoring her friend with more carefully worked dresses, which enhance her natural beauty, accuses Rōsele of drawing away her gentlemen friends by unfair means, and finally when she finds herself more and more abandoned by her acquaintances, she completely breaks off her relations with the friend of her childhood. They lead a separate existence. At the age of thirty-five Perele is bowed down with sorrows: she has buried a husband and two children, has again married, and her days are taken up in the care of her family and unpleasant discussions with her jealous husband. Rōsele has married a sickly man with whom she has nothing in common. He married her only for her money. Their child is as frail as its father, and Rōsele's days are passed in sordid cares and worry.
"So passed another twenty-five years. After a long severe winter there came at last the young, fresh spring in all his glory, with his many attendants of all kinds who warble, whistle, chatter, and clatter, in the trees, in the air, on the earth, and in the grass. The streets are dry, the air is warm.... In an avenue of trees, on the sunlit side of it, two old women are walking together. They are dressed in old-fashioned, long burnouses, and hold umbrellas in their hands against which they lean. Their faces are wrinkled, their heads drooping to one side, and they stop every few steps they take, and speak with their toothless mouths:
"'My dear Perele, this has been a long winter!'
"'Yes, a frightful winter! Thanks to the Lord it is over. To-day it is good—the sun shines so warmly! But I have put on my burnous for all that! You, Rōsele, have done likewise! No, it is not yet warm enough for us.'
"They seated themselves on the nearest bench and continued their conversation:
"'I am getting tired; I think we had better go home.'
"'Yes, I am getting hungry, for I have eaten to-day only a broth. I cannot eat anything except it be a soft, fresh roll with milk or something like it.'
"'I, too....'
"And thus old age has again made peace among the two companions of long ago. They love each other again just as before when they were children, and they did not know that one was pretty and the other homely, ... for now they are again alike! Perele and Rōsele have both alike bent forms and wrinkled faces; both have no teeth in their mouths, and their heads droop alike. Only Perele has come to it from living too much, and Rōsele from not living at all. The two gowns, which the same tailor has made for them for the Passover from the same piece of cloth and according to the same fashion, have pleased them equally well, and they need not complain of the workmanship."
Of the many other shorter sketches we might mention the touching scenes in his 'Purim and Passover,' in which 'How Grandfather's Child put on her First Shoes' is the most pathetic. Not less pathetic is the one named 'The Uncle,' in which are contrasted the open-hearted reception of the wealthy uncle in the house of his poor nephew and the niggardly treatment of the nephew by his relative in the large city. Through all of Spektor's works passes the same melancholy strain, coupled with a strict objectivity of conception. This objectivity does not leave him even in cases where one would certainly expect him to express an opinion of his own. He has given us, for example, a most important series of sketches under the name of 'Three Persons,' in which the tendencies among the Russian Jews in the last quarter of a century are described with remarkable clearness; and he proceeds to point out their various modifications under the influence of the riots. Here, it seems, one would look for an individual conviction, for he must surely side with one of the parties discussed by him so thoroughly; and yet he does not once betray his personal preference. This series is indispensable to any one who wants to study the current of opinion among the Russian Jews, previous to the development of the Zionistic movement which now is uppermost in their minds. We are introduced successively to the Palestinian, the Assimilator, and the Neither-here-nor-there. A careful psychological study is made of all, with apparently negative results as to their respective merits. They are all three insincere with their fellow-sufferers and belong to their organizations only for personal advantage. The sad impression made by the reading of these interesting chapters is anticipated by the motto placed at the head of them: Laughing is not always in ridicule; laughing is sometimes a bitter weeping.
Among his best longer stories is 'Reb Treitel,' which gives a good insight into the life of a small town away from all railroads and off the highway of travel. One of the most necessary institutions in every Jewish town is the Mikwe, the bathhouse, not so much for sanitary purposes as for the ritual ablutions of the women. This mikwe is the centre of our story. Around it are grouped the various incidents which emanate from it like the arteries from the heart. The bathhouse is consumed by fire, and the town is all agog with excitement. There is no immediate outlook that a new one will be built, and in the interim Reb Treitel, the wagon-driver, who has been despairing of making both ends meet, is doing a splendid business by taking the women to the neighboring town for their ritual ablutions. He manages to keep all competition away and to lay a heavy tribute on the feminine population. Spektor has also begun a historical novel dealing on the life of the founder of the sects of the Khassidim. He does not represent him there as an impostor, but as a truly pious man, which he was, no doubt, in reality. So far he has published only chapters on his youth, but these promise a sympathetic treatment of which Spektor is eminently capable as an unbiassed author.
In 1887 Spektor severed his connection with the Volksblatt and settled in Warsaw. The time now being ripe for a purely literary periodical, he started the first of the kind in Judeo-German literature. He was, however, delayed for various reasons, and another collective volume appeared in the South before he was able to issue his own. He named it Der Hausfreund and intended it as an annual, but the Government having interfered on various occasions, there have appeared only five numbers so far. The annual reflects all of Spektor's peculiarities. Like his own writings, all of the articles and stories contained in it are adapted for the popular ear, and are written in a simple, comprehensible style. The scientific discussions are of a rudimentary character, and the criticisms of books and the Jewish theatre, which from now on becomes an important factor in Judeo-German literature, are intended more as guides to the reader than as correctives to the authors. Though somewhat primitive in its form, this periodical was calculated to advance the cause of letters among the masses of the people. Among his contributors we find in the first two numbers such names as Goldfaden, Zunser, Samostschin, Buchbinder, M. Gordon, Frug, Linetzki, Abramowitsch. Among the other writers there are some who had before written for the Volksblatt but whose productions are insignificant. A few of them, however, begin to develop a greater activity, and deserve special mention. Among these are the novelists 'Isabella,' Dienesohn, the collector of legends Meisach, and the critic Frischmann.
'Isabella' is the pseudonym of Spektor's wife. She has written but a few sketches,[96] but some of them show remarkable talent. She unites her husband's objectivity with a fine discrimination of humor which is her own. She likes to dwell on comparisons between the older and the newer generation, and to point out the evil effects of a superficial modern culture. In 'The Orphan' she introduces us to the house of Schmuel Dāwid, who tries to keep himself occupied by teaching children penmanship. He is too simple-minded and good-hearted to battle with the world. The supporter of the house is his wife, Treine, who makes a living by usury. They shower their attentions on their only descendant, the peevish granddaughter Jentke. She is sent to the gymnasium and later is loved by a young scholar, a lank, consumptive-looking fellow, with whom she joins one of those narrower circles so common among the students of Russia, where they propose remedies for the betterment of the world and dream of the millennium near at hand. Their one desire is to identify themselves with the Russians at large. Then come the awful years 1881 and 1882. All of a sudden new ideals begin to animate the younger generation. Jentke's lover no longer calls himself Fyodor Sebastyanovitch, but his visiting card bears the homely Jewish name Peessach ben Schabsi, of which the former was only a Russified form. He becomes an ardent defender of his race. Later he marries Jentke, and a new career begins for them. They forget all their ideals of the period before the riots, to which they so readily subscribed; they do not persevere in their intention to devote their energies to their people. They live only for themselves. They begin to hoard money, and Jentke is much more hardhearted than her grandmother, for having abandoned the religious convictions of the older woman, she has not received any new moral basis for her actions. The grandmother dies, and the lonely, half-starved grandfather in vain tries to find a resting-place in their house. They send him away in a most cruel manner.
Her other sketches are of a similar character. In all of these, she points out the dangers from a superficial modern education, and the insincerity of the self-styled reformers who are ever ready to suggest a remedy for the ills that befall her people. Her characters are drawn from that new class of half-learned men and women who, receiving their training in the gymnasium, were just on the point of disappearing from the fold of the Jewish Church, when they were violently cast back into it by the persecutions from without. Of an entirely different tendency are the writings of Jacob Dienesohn, although akin to 'Isabella' in the sympathy he shows for the older generation. Dienesohn had begun his career in 1875, when he published a novel 'The Dark Young Man,' after which he grew silent. In 1885 he took up his literary work, since when he has produced two large novels and several shorter sketches. His first work was very popular. He depicted in it the machinations of an orthodox young man of the older type, who felt it his duty to lay stumbling-blocks in the way of one who strove to acquire worldly knowledge. Dienesohn occupies a peculiar place in Judeo-German literature. He is the only one who has attempted the lachrymose, the sentimental novel. He began writing at a time when Dick had prepared the ground for the romantic story, and Schaikewitsch had started on his sentimental drivel. But while these entirely failed to produce something wholesome, Dienesohn gained with his first book an unusual success. He drew his scenes from familiar circles, and his men and women are all Jews, with a sphere of action not unlike the one his readers moved in. Readers consequently were more easily attracted to him, and carried away a greater fund of instruction. His feminine audiences have wept tears over his work, and the author has received letters from orthodox young men, who assured him that although the description of the Dark Young Man fitted them, they would not descend to the vile methods of the hero of the book in pursuing differently minded men.
During his renewed activity, which began in the Volksblatt ten years after his first novel had been printed, he dwelt on that period in the history of the Russian Jews when they were just commencing to take to the new culture, when it still meant a struggle and a sacrifice to tear oneself away from the ties which united one with the older generation. In the 'Stone in the Way' he describes the many hardships which his hero had to overcome ere he succeeded in acquiring an education. In 'Herschele' (still unfinished) the same subject is treated in the case of a young mendicant Talmudical scholar, who is beset, not only by the usual difficulties, but who is, in addition, trying to suppress his earthly love for the daughter of the woman who furnishes him with a dinner on every Wednesday. Dienesohn treats with loving gentleness all the characters he writes about.[97] Like Spektor, he attacks no one directly, and, like him, sarcasm has no place in his works. His most touching and, at the same time, the most perfect of his shorter stories is the one entitled 'The Atonement Day.'[98] He introduces us there to a scene in the synagogue where an old woman is praying fervently. Her devotion is interrupted by her thoughts of her daughter at home whom she had enjoined to fast on that awful day, although she had just given birth to a son. For a long time her religious convictions outweigh her maternal feelings, but, at last, her natural sentiment is victorious, and she hurries home to insist on her daughter's eating something. In this way the new-born babe is saved. Thirty years pass. The old woman has died, and her daughter Chane is brought before us on the same Atonement day. She has grown old, while her son has, in the meantime, finished at the university, and is a practising physician. She, too, is praying fervently, and thinking with awe of the day when young and old, the pious and the sinner alike, come to the synagogue and invoke the mercy of the Lord with contrition of spirit. Her eyes search in vain for her son among the crowd congregated below. The hours pass, and he does not appear. Faint with hunger from the long fasting and grieving at her son's apostasy, she falls sick and soon dies. In her last agony she makes her son promise her that he will, at least once a year, on the Atonement day, visit the synagogue. After that, one can see every year, on the awful day, the physician in deep devotion in the house of the Lord.
The circle which has Spektor for its centre is characterized by the use of Western literary forms for its productions, which yet are all of a distinctly Jewish type. The object of the authors is to create a sound literature for the masses. Incidentally, the literature is also to give positive instruction; but primarily, it is to draw away attention from the worthless books of the previous decade, and to create a decided taste for good works. These authors also intend to give the people a feeling for their racial solidarity, to acquaint them with the thought of the best of their race in an accessible form. This period has completely broken its connection with the older Haskala, for the writers no longer dream of substituting German culture for the ignorance of the masses. Nor do they preach of assimilation and Russian education, for that has signally failed to be of any use to the Jews in their struggle for recognition. In the nineties, the dream of Zionism was to haunt these writers, and many others who were to write then. But, in the meanwhile, they have no other definite purpose than to create a national consciousness, to instil in them the idea of human dignity, to develop individual character. While, on the one hand, they do not give them any new cultural ideals for those of the past generations, they have, on the other, no suggestions to make in regard to the religious faith of the orthodox, or the absence of religious convictions of the younger men and women. They do not attack the old Law, they do not side with any modern philosophy. Khassid and Misnaged, the unenlightened and enlightened, are the same in the scale of their judgment. It is not time, they think, to discuss about any such matters, but to gather in all the unfortunate ones into one brotherhood. The upper classes who have had many advantages in life, can shift for themselves in forming their convictions, but it is the lower strata that need guidance, and it is the duty of those who are better informed to devote their energies to the deliverance of their wretched brothers and sisters. Such is the doctrine of these writers. These sentiments are not alone the result of the riots of 1881. They are a reflex of the Russian Narodniks, who, at about the same time, were preaching the necessity of going among the people, of identifying oneself with the masses, of devoting all one's energies in the cause of the peasant, the artisan, the factory hand.
The Jargon is not represented in a contemptuous way, nor are apologies made for its use. On the contrary, the authors try to show the wealth of its expressions and to collect data for its history. Lerner writes a good essay on the folksong in a popular style; Dienesohn gives a review of the older writings and their authors; Spektor and Bernstein publish a large number of Judeo-German proverbs; Buchbinder collects popular superstitions; and Meisach writes a small book of Jewish folktales. The latter has also told in Judeo-German some of the legends from the Talmud and other sources. He has written some stories in the style of Dick, but like those they are disfigured by a disregard of style. The activity of these men still continues, independently of the new movements advocated by other writers and unimpeded by the new faith of Zionism.
SOLOMON RABINOWITSCH began writing for the Volksblatt[99] at about the same time as Spektor, and shortly after the appearance of the Hausfreund he issued an annual, Die Jüdische Volksbibliothēk, which was of even a more pretentious character than its contemporary. Both authors were animated by the same ideas when they started on their literary careers and when they commenced publishing their periodicals. But a glance at the writings of the two is sufficient to convince us that there is a wide difference in the methods pursued by them, and in the results achieved. Rabinowitsch is impulsive, enthusiastic, quick-witted, sarcastic, and these qualities of his character are discernible in all his productions. He has attempted many things, poetry, playwriting, novels, criticism, and he is successful in all. He has been a merchant and an author, has vaulted over from a pure realism to the illusive dream of Zionism, and bids fair to follow new ideals should such present themselves to him. He is in every sense an artistic nature.
While connected with the Volksblatt he wrote a number of sketches and short stories. The first one to attract the attention of the critic in the Voschod was his 'Child's Play,'[100] after which his new books never failed of bringing out favorable comments in that Russian periodical. He depicts scenes from his own childhood, or from that middle class into which his fortune, an inheritance of his wife, brought him. His impulsiveness keeps him from elaborating his sketches into long novels, such as Spektor and Dienesohn have produced. There is rarely a complicated plot in them, but the separate situations are painted with great clearness and in bold relief. One may forget the story, but one will never forget his characters. They have all of them their sharply defined individuality, their language, their circle of thought. We get acquainted with them through their actions rather than through the author's description, and we like them not for the parts they play in the story, but for their strong personalities, equally pronounced in their virtues as in their weaknesses. The men and women he describes we have met somewhere, and we shall again recognize should we meet them in actual life. The Russian critic, who is naturally in touch with his own literature, unconsciously thinks of this and that well-known character in the writings of Gogol and Ostrovski, when he speaks of Rabinowitsch's creations, and at times he actually gives them their Russian names. But Rabinowitsch does not imitate Gogol and Ostrovski, at least not purposely. He is himself possessed of a humor which is not dissimilar to that of the Russian authors, and the society which he describes is not unlike the one Gogol knew half a century ago, and Ostrovski found even at a later time among the merchant class of Moscow. He is a close observer, and knows how to separate the wheat from the chaff, to present to the reader only the essential characteristics, and not to burden the story with subjective discussions.
Although Rabinowitsch may have started in the literary field with no other idea than the current one of elevating the lower classes, there is certainly nothing in his works to show that that has long remained his main object. He writes to entertain, and not to instruct. Moreover, he draws his subjects from a class of society with which the masses are not particularly well acquainted. With him the last spark of the didactic ideals of the Haskala has entirely vanished. He is above all else a litterateur who is addressing an audience with a decided taste for good literature. He is, therefore, more calculated to win the ears of the better classes than of the lowly of his race, to exercise a corrective influence on the manners of the middle class than to educate or console the masses.
Of his longer works, 'Stempenju' is the most artistically conceived and most carefully executed. In his previous productions such as 'Child's Play,' and 'Sender Blank,' he had humorously depicted scenes from the life of the merchant class. In the first of these, he introduces us into the life and love of a rich man's spoiled, half-educated son. In the second, which he names a novel without love, we get an excellent picture of a tyrant and miser, the terror of his family, the merchant Sender Blank. He is on his death-bed, and his congregated children are, each in his own way, dreaming of the moment when they shall be free to do as they like, when they shall no longer be kept in poverty. But Sender Blank gets well again, and his family departs, each one to his home with shattered hopes. In 'Stempenju' we have a more carefully laid plot, and his first attempt at a novel in which a romantic love plays a part. Stempenju is a violinist, the leader of a band that plays at weddings. He has great talent for music and has developed his powers entirely by self-instruction. He is a real artist, and like many others of his profession takes life easy, and is of amorous propensities. He has frequently made love to Jewish women, but the latter generally pay no attention to his assurances. But once he falls in with a girl who takes his words in earnest, and in a prosaic way, without any idea of love on her part, compels him to marry her. She takes him in her hands and would have him lead a settled, prosaic life also. But he finds relief from his sordid existence every time he journeys away with his band to play at some wedding. Once he notices upon such an occasion a young married woman who awakes in him the first inkling of a real, romantic love. Rochel—that is her name—is both beautiful in form and kind and lovable in character. After many overtures he almost succeeds in gaining her love. It is the easier to succumb to Stempenju's importunities since she has a silly, worthless man for a husband. She finally comes out victoriously from her inner struggle, for her religious conviction of the holiness of the marriage ties are stronger in her than her natural inclination. Stempenju returns home, and tries to find his consolation and relief from his scolding wife by having more frequent recourse to his violin. He plays even more sweetly and more sadly than before.
His other large novel, 'Jossele Ssolowee,' is also a characterization of the life of an artist, this time a singer. Of his shorter sketches it is hard to select one as the best, as they are all well written. We shall take at random the one entitled 'The Colonization of Palestine.' Selig, the tailor, has read something about the colonization scheme in Palestine. He joins a society for the promotion of that idea, and finally abandons his work to go to the neighboring town, where he has heard there is a society that has a fund from which to pay the travelling expenses of prospective settlers in the Holy Land. After a great deal of trouble, he finds the president of the society, who is vexed at having applicants but no members ready as settlers to support the scheme, for fund there is none. The tailor offers a small coin as his contribution, the first that has been given, and returns home a wiser man and more satisfied with his lot. The story is told humorously, and is meant as a sarcasm at the readiness of the Jews to form new schemes and support them with eloquence of speech, but not in a substantial manner.
Rabinowitsch has also attempted a kind of poetic prose in his 'Nosegay,' but in this he has not been very successful. He is at best where he can make use of wit and sarcasm, and that he has been able to apply better in his stories and comedies. Of the latter his 'Jaknehos' is a good picture taken from the life of the men who do business on 'Change. Here again the plot is the minor part of the play, but the separate scenes are drawn in bold strokes.
When Rabinowitsch came into his fortune, he conceived the idea of devoting his energy and his money to the creation of a periodical such as had never before existed in Judeo-German literature. Only two volumes appeared, when bad speculations on 'Change made him a poor man. These two annuals show that had he been more fortunate, he soon would have brought Judeo-German letters to a height where they would have taken place by the side of the best in Europe. His enthusiasm, his critical acumen, his talents, fitted him eminently for that undertaking. Spektor's aim in issuing the Hausfreund was the more modest one of furnishing the people with wholesome reading. How difficult his task has been can be seen from the fact that the articles for his periodical are not paid for. They are voluntary contributions by those who have the welfare of the masses at heart. However good the forces may be, it is not possible in these degenerate days to expect a natural development of a literature when the writers can hope to earn neither glory nor money by their labors. No Judeo-German litterateur has ever been able to make more than a scanty living, and that only sporadically, out of his books. But here came Rabinowitsch, who paid liberally for all the articles furnished him. That was an innovation from which only good could result. But the editor not only paid his contributors; he demanded well-written articles, and he accepted only the best of those. In his annual we find departments,—Belles Lettres, Criticism, Science, Bibliography, each being strictly defined in its proper sphere. In the division of belles lettres we find all the best authors of the time. Here also appeared for the first time articles from the pen of Frischmann, M. J. Rabinowitsch, and Perez, who belong among the most talented of Judeo-German writers. Among the scientific articles there are several of a historical character, such as 'On the History of the Jews in Podolia,' by Litinski, 'The Massacres of Gonto in Uman and the Ukraine,' by Dr. Skomarowski. There are several discussions on popular medicine, mainly from the pen of the indefatigable worker in that direction for more than a quarter of a century, Dr. Tscherny, and there is one on 'The History of Judeo-German Literature' by A. Schulmann. The latter is the result of years of investigation and is remarkably rich in bibliographical data. It would do honor to any scientific periodical. The part given to bibliography is of great importance to the student of Judeo-German literature, as that bibliography is in such a bad condition that it is not possible for certain periods, especially the older, to give absolutely correct data. But the most interesting department in the periodical is that of criticism, which is a new factor in Judeo-German. Heretofore a few scattered remarks on books might be found in the Volksblatt, but a systematic treatment of that branch of literature was unknown to the older writers, and would have been of no use to the readers. But here, in the Volksbibliothēk, we not only find this new departure, but there are not less than eighty pages devoted to it in the first volume.
Rabinowitsch had published but a short time before a volume entitled 'Schomer's Mischpet,' i.e. 'The Judgment of Schaikewitsch,' which marks a new era. In this book the author passes in review the writings of Schaikewitsch and his like who have been supplying the people with a worthless literature. It is written in an entertaining style, in the form of a judicial proceeding, and has produced to a certain extent the effect that it was intended to produce: the sale of those books fell off rapidly, and thus the field was again free for a new and better class of works. It cannot be said that Rabinowitsch has always been just to the men under judgment, but on the whole his opinion is sound, and his verdicts will stand. In his zeal he has sometimes been led to make sweeping statements, by which he has left some loopholes to the opponents who have taken him to task. However, criticism from now on becomes an established institution, and no author can escape a thorough inspection. The first to follow the example of Rabinowitsch was Frischmann, who brought out the same year a few sound reviews in the Hausfreund. In the Volksbibliothēk that duty is attended to by Rabnizki[101] and the editor. They not only criticise unworthy productions, but also direct the attention to good books, and encourage young writers if they seem to deserve encouragement. Rabinowitsch's talent in this direction is shown at its best in his biting sarcasm in reviewing Perez's poetry[102] (although he is not entirely just to him), and still better in his witty criticism of the various dictions used in Judeo-German. Perez, who is a genius of no mean proportions and who has started out in new directions in literature, has somehow aroused the displeasure of the critics, who will not put up with his symbolism. Frischmann has taken him to task for his alleged obscurity and other imagined faults in a series of masterly caricatures.[103] Frischmann also does not spare others who incur his wrath, and though one need not subscribe to his judgments, one cannot help learning useful things by his anatomies. By these we see, among other things, what progress Judeo-German is making; for individuality of style must be pronounced to deserve imitation and parody. Frischmann has also written some pretty tales of a fantastic nature, such as fairy tales, and a few from actual life.[104] His stories are all well worth reading, particularly on account of the excellent style he cultivates. M. J. Rabinowitsch's stories are mainly translations of his own Russian compositions.[105] They are all pictures from the Ghetto in Russia and Roumania, not unlike those by Bernstein and Kompert. They lack the spontaneity of the Judeo-German writers, but are carefully executed as to form.
By far the most original author of this latest period is Perez,[106] whose poetical works have been discussed before. With him Judeo-German letters enter into competition with what there is best in the world's literature, where he will some day occupy an honorable place. Among his voluminous works there is not one that is mediocre, not one that would lose anything of its comprehensibleness by being translated into another language. Although they at times deal with situations taken from Jewish life, it is their universal human import that interests him, not their specifically racial characteristics. It is mere inertia and the desire to serve his people that keep him in the ranks of Judeo-German writers. He does not belong there by any criterions that we have applied to his confreres, who themselves complain that his symbolism is inaccessible to the masses for whom he pretends to write. While this accusation is certainly just in the case of some of his works, it cannot be brought up in many other cases, where, in spite of the allegory, mysticism, or symbolism underlying his tale, there is a sufficient real residue of intelligible story for the humblest of his readers. He, too, aims at the education of his people, but in a vastly different sense from his predecessors. It is not the material information of mere facts that he strives for, nor even the broader culture of the schools that he would substitute for the Jewish lore and religious training, nor is he satisfied, with Spektor, to rouse the dormant national consciousness. His sympathies are with humanity at large, and the Jews are but one of the units that are to be redeemed from the social slavery under which the wretched of the world groan. It is those who have become timid under oppression of whatsoever form, who have lost the power of thinking, who have developed only the power of suffering, who are saints without knowing it, that Perez loves best. To them he would restore the human rights so long withheld from them, not by political and social enfranchisement, but by a consciousness of their human dignity which must precede all reform. To those to whom belongs the Kingdom of Heaven must also be given the Kingdom on Earth. While, nevertheless, the material things are withheld from them, there is no reason why the spiritual things should not be turned over to them. Perez, for one, offers gladly all he has, his genius, in the service of the lowly. Literature, according to him, is not to be a flimsy pastime of the otiose, but a consolation to those who have no other consolation, a safe and pleasurable retreat for those who are buffeted about on the stormy sea of life. For these reasons he writes in Judeo-German and not in any other language with which he is conversant, and for these same reasons he prefers to dwell with the downtrodden and the submerged.
To these people he devotes his best energies, and he uses the same care in filing and finishing his works that he would use if he were writing for a public trained in the best thoughts of the world and used to the highest type of literature. His first prose work, though not the first to be printed, was a small volume entitled 'Well-known Pictures,' containing three stories: 'The Messenger,' 'What Is a Soul?' and 'The Crazy Beggar-Student.' In the first he tells of the last errand of an aged messenger who through cold and rain and snow is making his way on foot to a distant village where he has to deliver an important document. He trudges along in hunger and pain, but not a word of complaint escapes his lips. Through his head pass old recollections of the time when his wife was still alive, when his children were all gathered about him. They have left him, but he is sure they are getting on well in their new homes, for, he consoles himself, bad news travels fast. His strength gives out, and he seats himself on a heap of snow to take a rest. He begins to dream of the not distant inn where the wife of the innkeeper will prepare a warm broth for him. He already sees himself seated at the table when strange persons enter the room. He soon recognizes them as his sons, and they embrace him and kiss him impetuously. In vain he begs them to desist from their choking embraces, for he is old and feeble. He begs them to be careful with him, for he has been intrusted with a sum of money that must be brought to its place of destination.... The old messenger was found dead, his hand upon his coat pocket in which he carried the intrusted document.
The second sketch is of a more cheerful character. It tells of the many troubles and doubts that a certain boy has ere he discovers what a soul really is. When very young his father dies, and they tell him that his soul has flown to heaven. Ever after he imagines the soul to be a bird. But he is ridiculed for that belief by his teacher's monitor. The teacher himself is accustomed to maltreat the boys and whip them mercilessly. He explains to them that the punishment of the body is good for the soul. What, then, is the soul? the young boy asks himself again. Then the teacher tells the children many fairy tales about the prenatal life of the soul, when the angel of life instructs it daily in the wisdom of the Bible and the Talmud. And that belief is soon taken from him by his instructor of penmanship, who has a turn to liberal ideas. So the boy keeps on wavering from belief to doubt and back again until the age of seventeen or eighteen, when he is studying the Talmud with a new teacher. Once, in his absence, it occurs to him to get the opinion of Gütele, his beautiful daughter, who is known by the name of the wise Gütele, on the question which has been puzzling him so long, and for which he has suffered so often in his life. With trembling he asks her:
"'They say, Gütele, that you are wise. Tell me, then, I beg you, what is a soul?'
"She smiled and answered:
"Only all at once she grew sad, and tears filled her eyes.
"'I just happened to think,' she said, 'when my mother of blessed memory was alive, my father used to say that she was his soul ... they loved each other so much!...'
"I do not know how it came to me, only I suddenly took hold of her hand, and trembling, said:
"'Gütele, would you like to be my soul?'
"She answered me, softly:
"'Yes.'"
From these two soulful, tender stories, we pass to one not less pathetic and an even more profound psychological study. The beggar-student, harmlessly insane, has grown faint from two days' fasting and long poring over the Talmud, and is discussing with himself whether he is one, or two, or more, and whether he is really himself. He has finally the same doubts of Wolf the Merchant, who is just reading in the Talmud. He imagines that three Wolfs are sitting there: one who is trying to cheat God with his piety; one who cheats his fellow-men in his shop; and one who beats his wife who furnishes the beggar-student with an occasional meal. He takes a violent dislike to the third Wolf, and would like to kill him, but he does not wish to injure the other two Wolfs. The monologue of this beggar-student, told in about twenty octavo pages, is one of the most remarkable to be found in any literature: it must be read in the original to be fully appreciated.
With such a book Perez made his entrance into the field of letters. To say that his future works show a riper talent would be to place too low an estimate on his first book, which, in spite of the many excellent things he has written, still remains among the very best. In 1891, when Spektor's annual was temporarily suspended, and Rabinowitsch's periodical had ceased appearing, Perez issued a new periodical, Die jüdische Bibliothēk, which he intended to be a semi-annual, but of which only three volumes have so far been issued. In the introduction to the first volume Perez makes a plea for the education of the people, in which are the following significant words: "Help us educate the poor, wretched people; leave them not a prey to fanatics, who will suck out the last trace of blood and the last trace of marrow from their lean bones. Leave them not in the hands of the visionaries, who will entice them into wildernesses! Let not boys and school-children lead them by the nose,—have pity on the people! Let them not fall! The people have in themselves a certain amount of vital power, a fund of energy. The people are the carriers of a civilization that the world does not undervalue, of ideas that would be of great use to it. The people are an ever living flower.... In daytime, when the sun shines, when the spirit of man is developing, it revives and unfolds its leaves; but no sooner does dark night approach than it closes up again, shrivels up, and goes back into itself.... It is then that it has the appearance of a common weed ... and when the sun once more rises, some time passes before the sun seeks out the flower and the flower discovers that the sun shines.... At night it becomes dusty and soiled, so that the beams of light cannot penetrate it easily! Help the people to recognize the sun early in the morning!... But the main thing, means must be devised for the people to earn a living...."
In conformity with this platform, Perez calls his new periodical a literary, social, and economical periodical. Not only did the difficult task of editing this novel magazine devolve on Perez: he had also to supply the greater part of the literature himself, for there existed no writers in Judeo-German who could follow him readily in his new departure. He had to write the greater part of the scientific department, all of the reviews, all the editorials. In addition, he furnished most of the poetry and the novels. The few other writers who published their articles in this magazine owed their development to the editor's fostering care: they had nearly all been encouraged for the first time by him. Of his scientific articles particular mention must be made of his long essay 'On Trades,' which is a popularization of political economy, brought down to the level of the humblest reader. The admirable, entertaining style, the aptness of the illustrations, and the absence of doctrinarianism make it one of the most remarkable productions in popular science. Still more literary and perfect in form are his 'Pictures of a Provincial Journey.' It seems that Perez had been sent into the province for the sake of collecting statistical data on the condition of the Jews resident there. This essay is apparently a diary of his experiences on that trip. We do not remember of having read in any literature any journal approaching this one in literary value. What makes it particularly interesting is that it is written so that it will interest those very humble people about whom he is writing. The picture of misery which he unrolls before us, however saddening and distressing, is made so attractive by the manner of its telling that one cannot lay aside the book until one has read the whole seventy quarto pages.
Perez has written more than fifty sketches, all of them of the same sterling value as the three described above. Every new one is an additional gem in the crown he is making for himself. They are all characterized by the same tender pathos, the same excellence of style, the same delicacy of feeling. He generally prefers the tragic moments in life as fit objects for his sympathetic pen, but he has also treated in a masterly manner the gentle sentiment of love. But it is an entirely different kind from the romantic love, that he deems worthy of attention. It is the marital affection of the humblest families, which is developed under difficulties, strengthened by adversity, checkered by misfortune; it is the saintliest of all loves that he tells about as no one before him has ever told. In the same manner he likes to dwell on all the virtues which are brought out by suffering, which are evolved through misery and oppression, which are more gentle, more unselfish, more divine, the lower we descend in the scale of humanity. Nor need one suppose that in order to show his characters from that most advantageous side, the author has to resort to disguises of idealization. They are no better and no worse than one meets every day and all around us; but they are such as only he knows who is not deterred by the shabbiness of their dress and the squalor of their homes from making their intimate acquaintance. They do not carry their virtues for show, they do not give monetary contributions for charities, they do not join societies for the promotion of philanthropic institutions, they do not preach on duties to God and on the future life, they are not even given to the expression of moral indignation at the sight of sin. But they are none the less possessed of the finer sentiments which come to the surface only in the narrower circle of their families, in their relations to their fellow-sufferers. Not even the eloquent advocate of the people generally cares to enter that unfamiliar sphere as Perez has done. His affection for the meanest of his race is not merely platonic. He not only knows whereof he speaks: he feels it; and thus we get the saddest, the tenderest, the sweetest stories from the life of the lowliest of the Jews that have ever been written.
In 1894 Perez published a collective volume, 'Literature and Life,' which contains, like his periodical, mostly productions of his own. As they were composed at some later time than those spoken of above, and as they contain some matter in which he appears in a new rôle, we shall discuss the volume at some length. In the introduction are given his general aims, which are not different from those expressed in his former publication. The final words of it are: "We want the Jew to feel like a man, to take part in all that is human, to live and strive humanly, and if he is offended, to feel offended like a man!" The first sketch is entitled 'In the Basement.' It is the story of the incipient marital love of a young couple who are so poor that they live in a dark basement, in a room that serves as a dwelling for several families whose separate 'rooms' are divided off from each other only by thin, low partitions. The second is 'Bontsie Silent,' which is given in our Chrestomathy. It belongs to the same category of sketches as his 'The Messenger.' It presents, probably better than any other, the author's conception of the character of the virtues of the long-suffering masses. Who can read it without being moved to the depth of his heart? There is no exaggeration in it, no melodrama, nothing but the bitter reality. It expresses, in a more direct way than anything else he has written, his faith that the Kingdom of Heaven belongs to the lowly.
The sketch named 'The Fur-Cap' is one of the very few that he has written as an attack on the Khassidic Rabbi. There is here, however, a vast difference in the manner of Perez and of Linetzki. While the latter goes at it in a direct way, with club in hand, and bluntly lets it fall on the head of the fanatic, Perez has above all in mind the literary form in which he clothes his attack, and we get from him an artistic story which must please even if the thrusts be not relished. The Rabbi never appears in public without his enormous fur-cap, which is really the insignia of his office. In this story we find the furrier engaged in a monologue, in which he tells of his delight in making the Rabbi's cap. He feels that it is he who gives all importance to that dignitary, for it is the cap that makes the Rabbi. He relates of the transformation of a common mortal into an awe-inspiring interpreter of God's will on earth. No important occurrence in life, no birth, marriage, or death, can take place without the approval of him who wears that fur-cap. It is the cap, not the man, and his wisdom, that sanctions and legalizes his various acts. Were it not for the cap, it would not be possible to tell right from wrong. This fine bit of sarcasm is not a mere attack at the sect of the Khassidim; it is also meant as an accusation of our whole social system, with its conventional lies. Perez does not show by his writings to what particular party he belongs, but he is certainly not with the conservatives. He is with those who advocate progress in its most advanced form. He is opposed to everything that means the enslavement of any class of people. In Russia, where one may not express freely views which are not in accord with the sentiments of the governing class, authors have to resort frequently to the form of allegory, fable, or distant allusion, instead of the more direct way of writers in constitutional countries. For these reasons pure literature is generally something more to the Russians than mere artistic productions. The novel takes frequently the place of a political pamphlet, of an essay on social questions. The stories of the Judeo-German authors share naturally the same fate with those of the Russians, and, consequently, cannot be free of 'tendencies' whenever the writers have in mind the treatment of subjects which would be dealt with severely by the censor. Much of the alleged obscurity of Perez's writings is just due to the desire of avoiding the censor's blue pencil, and the more dangerous a more direct approach becomes, the more delicate must be the allegory. The best of that class of literature is contained in this volume in a series entitled 'Little Stories for Big Men.'
The first of these is called 'The Stagnant Pool.' We are introduced here to the world of worms who live in the pool, who regard the green scum as their heaven, and pieces of eggshells that have fallen into it as the stars and the moon upon it. A number of cows stepping into the pool tear their heaven and kill all who are not hidden away in the slime. Only one worm survives to tell the story of the catastrophe, and he suggests to his fellows that that was not the heaven that was destroyed, that there is another heaven which exists eternally. For this the narrator was thought to be insane and was sent to an insane asylum. The second sketch, 'The Sermon of the Lamps,' in which the hanging lamp instructs a small table lamp to send its flame heavenwards and not to flicker in anarchistic fashion, is a fine allegory in which the social order of things is criticised. There are altogether ten such excellent allegories, or fables, in the collection, all of the same value. The last of Perez's articles in the book is a popular discussion of what constitutes property; it is written in the same style as his scientific works spoken of before.
From 1894 to 1896 Perez has been issuing small pamphlets of about thirty octavo pages at irregular intervals. They are called 'Holiday Leaves,' and bear each a special name appropriate for each particular occasion. A certain part of these pamphlets has stories and discussions to suit the occasions for which they are written, but on the whole their contents do not differ from those of his periodicals. Here again Perez has furnished most of the matter. The other writers are David Pinski, J. Goido, Solomon Grossglück, M. J. Freid, who also contributed to his earlier magazines. It is evident that they follow their master in the general manner of composition, though at a respectable distance. Of these, Freid[107] has written some good sketches of animal life. His 'Mursa' is the story of a bitch who has given birth to some puppies:—her love for her offspring, her madness when she finds her young ones drowned and gone, and her death by strangulation. 'Red Caroline, a Novel of Animal Life,' is a similar story from the life of a cow. They are well told and display talent in the author. Of the others, Pinski[108] deserves to be mentioned specially, both on account of the quantity and the quality of his work. Most of his sketches do not rise above the mediocre, but there are several that are as good as those of Spektor. The best of his are those that are entitled 'The Oppressed,' the first of which appeared in 'Literature and Life.' In this he tells of the tyranny exercised by a shopkeeper on his clerk, and of the timidity of his wretched subordinate, who merely ekes out an existence by working for him from daybreak until late at night from one end of the year to the other. The brutal master, the cowardly, downtrodden clerk, his courageous daughter who urges her father to leave the store in spite of the shopkeeper's protest, the scene at home, where his wife has just given birth to a child, where there is no money for a fire or for medicine,—all this is drawn dramatically and naturally. Goido[109] began to issue a aeries of stories in Wilna, in the manner of Perez's 'Holiday Leaves,' and they attracted Perez's attention, who encouraged him in his literary career. Regarding his career in America, we shall find him more especially mentioned in the next chapter.
After the financial failure of the different magazines started since 1887, only Spektor's Hausfreund has been able to survive with some degree of regularity. The last of this series appeared in 1896, after which Judeo-German letters seem to have been checked entirely. There still appear publications by societies, but they are all of a Zionistic nature. It is hard to foretell what the future of this literature will be. But having worked out such a variety of styles in the last fifteen years, it can hardly fail of presenting the same interesting features with which we have just become acquainted, unless, indeed, the intelligent classes abandon this field for other European languages and turn it over to the class of writers who have in view the filling of their pockets and not the good of the people. Then it will revert to the chaos into which it was led by Schaikewitsch and the like. In any case it will reflect the conditions from without; it will flourish in proportion as the Jews are oppressed by the government and public opinion; it will disappear when full rights shall have been accorded them. The latter are not to be hoped for in any appreciably near time, hence Judeo-German letters will continue to be an anomaly in Russia, in Galicia, and in Roumania for some time to come.