Fiddler on the Roof – From Under the Fig Tree

Year end

joselitDecember 27, 2015November 16, 2017Leave a comment

I was casting about for an appropriate topic for my end-of-the-year blog. Since everyone, from The New York Times on down, was busily engaged in compiling a list of 2015’s most memorable moments, its highs and lows, I thought I’d follow suit -- but with a twist: I’d take stock of this year’s most memorable academic moments. Perhaps, just perhaps, something approximating a pattern, or, better yet, a theme might emerge, endowing this exercise -- much less 2015 -- with an internal unity, even a degree of symmetry.

Original Fiddler on the Roof Broadway window card/Wikipedia

What if I were to summon up some of the more arcane administrative forms that had to be filed and re-filed over the course of the year, or recall the buzzwords, those equally arcane phrases, that filled the air at faculty meetings and conferences? Maybe recounting the grammatical gaffes and fatal mis-spellings committed by my students as well as chronicling my own mis-steps in the classroom might yield a profitable insight or two?

Just as I was about to compile my list, a brand-new production of Fiddler on the Roof debuted on Broadway, and to glowing reviews. Before I could say “Tradition,” I found my subject. Good-bye to my top ten; hello, once again, to this evergreen of Broadway musicals.

Between last year and this one, we’ve studied Fiddler in class, tracked its provenance and explored every nook and cranny of its production history to the point where we seemed to have exhausted every conceivable angle.

Not quite; there’s more. That the new production takes place within the context of an international refugee crisis freighted this tale of dislocation with even greater plangency.

Its ongoing resonance extended beyond the Great White Way. In honor of the play’s revival, a prominent synagogue in New York actually integrated Fiddler’s lyrical “Sabbath Prayer” into a Friday evening service, where it was sung full-throttle by not one but two cantors.

Now that’s what I call symmetry -- and a fitting conclusion to the year.

The printed word

joselitDecember 16, 2014November 16, 2017Leave a comment

As the semester draws to a close, I’m prompted to reflect on some of its highlights, from a lively cooking class with food writer Leah Koenig to an affecting performance, at the Arena Stage, of Fiddler on the Roof.

Middle East Librarians Association GW — Middle East Librarians Association display/GW

Though profoundly satisfying, both experiences were trumped by an unexpectedly moving encounter in the library: The Kiev Collection’s display of “Hebrew Printing in the Arab and Islamic World.” Assembled by its knowledgeable and sage curator, Brad Sabin Hill, and timed to coincide with the annual meeting of the Middle East Librarians Association, this assortment of 30-odd books touched me to my very core.

I’m not sure why. Surely, it wasn’t their subject matter, which ranged from grammatical commentaries on the Bible to a liturgy for mourners. Nor was it a matter of their visual properties, for virtually all of the books on display bore little by way of illustration. And it certainly wasn’t the simple, honest and direct manner in which they were exhibited, row upon row on a wood table. No bells and whistles, no pyrotechnics, dazzled, or distracted, the eye.

But dazzled I was, all the same. Perhaps it had to do with their geographical origins, which spanned Istanbul and Beirut, Tunis and Salonika, Alexandria and Aden -- places which the Jews once called home, but are no more. Then again, maybe it had to do with the ways in which these humble texts managed, somehow, to survive the vicissitudes of Jewish history and to come to rest in Washington, D.C.

Whatever the reason, I left the inviting precincts of the Kiev Collection heartened -- and haunted -- by the presence of these books and the stories they carry.

Calling all culture mavens

joselitNovember 12, 2013November 16, 2017Leave a comment

In the wake of the seemingly dire Pew Research Center study, the American Jewish establishment might be at a loss -- not for words, surely, but for ideas -- on how best to respond. Take heart. You needn’t go too far afield in search of reassurance and with it, heartening new forms of collective engagement. All you have to do is to visit Princeton next week, Columbia University in mid-January and the Skirball in Los Angeles a few months later. Pitch a tent in each one of these venues and you’ll encounter a dazzling round of Jewish cultural activities that is sure to lift your spirits.

Fiddler on the roof gives an impromptu concert in Adams Morgan, Washington, DC — Fiddler on the roof gives impromptu concert in Adams Morgan, Washington, D.C. Flickr/Adam Fagen

This coming Friday, Princeton -- yes, you’ve read that correctly -- will play host to a one day symposium, “Fiddler at 50,” that takes the measure of what Alisa Solomon, the author of the must-read, Wonder of Wonders: A Cultural History of Fiddler on the Roof, calls the most culturally insistent of theatrical productions. Drawing a mix of veteran theater-folk, including the redoubtable Sheldon Harnick, scholars like Solomon as well as the newest generation of Fiddler fans -- Princeton undergrads -- the event promises to enliven our understanding of one of American Jewry’s most enduring cultural milestones.

A few weeks later, Columbia will play host to a free, intensive and immersive one-week long workshop devoted to another one of American Jewry’s cultural touchstones: comics. The handiwork of Tent: Encounters with Jewish Culture, a recent initiative of the Yiddish Book Center, this confab offers a whirlwind of activities designed to send American Jewish twenty-somethings with a keen interest in comics into orbit -- and, when down on earth, in contact with one another.

Meanwhile, those who fancy themselves foodies, foodie-entrepreneurs or just good eaters should flock to Los Angeles in March for Tent: Food LA, yet another free, intensive and immersive one week-long workshop. This one brings together chefs, food writers and those with a hearty appetite for conversation and an abiding interest in Jewish cookery, then & now.

In each instance, as tradition crosses paths with modernity, the results are likely to be as inspiring -- and as surprising -- as fiddlers perched atop the roofs of Broadway.

Fiddling with Tradition

joselitMarch 4, 2012November 16, 2017Leave a comment

I don’t know about you, but every time I listen to the soundtrack of Fiddler on the Roof, my eyes well with tears and my feet start moving this way and that.

In this, I’m not alone. Arguably one of the most popular of Broadway productions, Fiddler has captured the country’s imagination ever since it made its debut in 1964, firmly embedding “Sunrise, Sunset” and “Tradition” in the American playbook.

What’s more, I suspect that the play and the film that followed have done more to acquaint the American public with the ups and downs of modern Jewish history, as well as with the use of such expressions as mazal tov and l’chayim, than all of the pious references to the Judaeo-Christian heritage combined.

How this tale of East European Jewry, which is based on the writings of Sholem Aleichem, became a staple of American popular culture constitutes a bit of a conundrum. Its success, after all, was hardly a surefire thing. But “wonder of wonders, miracle of miracles,” Fiddler did take hold.

Why it did is the compelling subject of Alisa Solomon’s forthcoming presentation, Fiddler’s Fortunes: The Mighty Afterlife of a Broadway Musical, which will take place on Monday, March 19th, at 7 p.m. at the DCJCC. To register for the event, which is free and open to the public, please go here.

Come one and all.

Coming Attractions

joselitDecember 18, 2011November 16, 2017Leave a comment

As the fall semester winds down, I’m sorry to see it go. So many wonderful events took place over the past couple of months – illuminating faculty presentations, lively student get-togethers, spirited literary readings, stimulating star turns by visiting artists and curators from Israel and Poland – that extended the Program’s reach and enriched the GW community.

The spring semester promises to be equally full. Heading the list is our annual Fleischman Lecture, which this year will be held on March 19th at the DC-JCC, with whom we just launched a most promising and vital partnership. The lecture will be delivered by the estimable Alisa Solomon of Columbia University who will be speaking about the making of Fiddler on the Roof.

Fascinating on its own terms, this landmark cultural production also has special meaning for those of us who call DC home: It debuted at the National Theater before making its way to Broadway. (See Frank Rich’s evocative memoir, Ghost Light, for the surprising details.)

Keeping things in the family, so to speak, the Program will also host a two-day Sholem Aleichem fest on April 24th and 25th. The first part of the festival will feature, among other things, a staged reading in both Yiddish and English translation of several of Sholem Aleichem’s short stories. Professor Max Ticktin, as well as several students from GW’s Department of Theatre and Dance, will be doing the honors.

The second part of the festival will feature a screening of Joseph Dorman’s recently released and widely acclaimed documentary on Sholem Aleichem, Laughing in the Darkness. To gild the lily, the filmmaker himself will be on hand to share with us some of the behind-the-scenes tales of how he came to make the film.

With such wonderful events on the horizon, 2012 promises to stimulate our intellects, tickle our funny bones and engage our imaginations. Who can ask for anything more?

The right name

joselitAugust 14, 2011November 16, 2017Leave a comment

I’ve been called many things in my day: Jocelyn, Jennifer, Jen, Joselit Weissman and on occasion (and hopefully in jest) even Gender Weissman Joselit, a name designed to highlight my stalwart embrace of feminism in matters large and small. Little wonder, then, that I sympathize with the fate that has recently befallen the celebrated man of Yiddish letters, Sholem Aleichem.

Thanks to Joseph Dorman’s affecting and insightful new film, Sholem Aleichem: Laughing in the Darkness, its eponymous subject is experiencing something of a new lease on life. At the very least, his name has probably appeared in print more times in the past month than in the previous 90-odd years since his demise in 1916.

It’s a reflection of our unfamiliarity with the literary protocols and linguistic conventions of an earlier era that we stumble when it comes to the man’s name.

The first time the creator of such enduring characters as Menachem Mendel and Tevye the Dairyman is referred to in an article, he is properly identified as Sholem Aleichem. So far, so good.

It’s the second reference that wreaks havoc. Nine times out of 10, he appears as “Aleichem,” as if Sholem were his first name and Aleichem his surname when, in fact, Sholem Aleichem is not, and has never been, the actual name of a person but rather a familiar Jewish greeting, the equivalent of “hello.” Sholem Aleichem was a pen name – and a rather warm and witty one, at that: an in-joke of the highest, and most intimate, order.

Those in the know do not take kindly to fiddling with his literary signature. As Sophie Stein, the granddaughter of Joseph Stein, the playwright of Fiddler on the Roof, learned the hard way, one messes with Sholem Aleichem’s name at one’s peril.

In a recent article in The Paris Review, which was prompted by Dorman’s film, Stein wrote about what Sholem Aleichem meant to her and her family. Whatever keen insights she may (or may not) have brought to bear mattered not a whit compared to the hue and cry that accompanied her repeated use of “Aleichem,” when referring to what she thought was the writer’s last name. Stein committed the ultimate onomastic faux pas.

The barrage of criticism prompted Ms. Stein to change her tune – and her references – and in later online versions of her text she called the writer by his full and rightful pen name.

That was the proper, and respectful, thing to do. Now, if only the New York Times would follow suit.

Update: Mea culpa

Much to my chagrin, I’ve just learned that I, too, committed an onomastic faux pas when writing last week about Ms. Stein’s piece in The Paris Review.

Instead of calling the author by her proper name, which is Sadie, I called her Sophie. Oh, the irony!

My deepest apologies.