Sunrise West (13 page)

‘There can be no more miracles,' brooded our violinist, Skurecki. ‘All our attempts to create a better man have miscarried.'

He'd just joined the Santa Maria drama circle, founded by Majer Ceprow and Mendel Singer, an actor-writer I had got to know. ‘I've written a play,' Skurecki told us. ‘
Holes
. It depicts a conflict between father and son — or if you like, between us camp survivors and the rest of the world.'

It turned out to be quite a play. Father says to son, ‘Whenever you do something wrong, I'll drive a nail into the wall as a reminder of your misdeed.' Before long there is no space left in the wall. ‘So where do we go from here?' the distressed father wonders. ‘There's only one way, son. You'll have to improve, become a decent person.' ‘I can't,' the boy answers, ‘it's in my blood — it's you who have begotten me. Build another wall.' ‘That's impossible,' says father. ‘The way you behave, there are not enough bricks on this planet.' At this point the Messiah arrives, father and son embrace each other — and the nails drop magically from the wall, one by one. ‘Father, father, look,' the son cries out, ‘there are no more nails in the wall!' ‘Yes,' father replies, ‘no more nails. But the holes you caused will remain forever.'

Holes
sparked a passionate discussion among audiences and players alike. Some saw a Christian shadow behind the conflict, accusing the playwright of calling for a reconciliation unwarranted at that time. And much as Skurecki longed for an independent Jewish state, his play did envisage a messianic resolution — an outlook which at that moment in our history was politically inexpedient. He had no option but to remove the play from our repertoire, and to let our metaphysical bickering, like most such quarrels, continue among the crevices of unspoken words.

‘Perhaps,' said Mendel Singer, ‘we should turn our attention to our old classics. Let's stage a play based on a Sholem Aleichem story, like
The Divorce
.'

‘No, we won't have it!' one of the actors protested. ‘We must stage plays that respond to our present national needs. We've had enough poverty and exile, enough Kasrilevkes.'

‘Poverty may be ugly, but ugliness is not essentially poor,' the erudite Singer remarked quietly, fiddling nervously with three strands of hair on his balding head. ‘And foolish utterance comes with too much empty talk.'

He was not to be subdued. ‘Kasrilevke, ironically, is the core of Jewish poverty's riches. No one can bring down a hopeful Kasril, who understands that he can survive only through laughter. Sadness is the privilege of the rich. And let us not forget for a moment,' he continued passionately, ‘that it was Yiddish-speakers from the Kasrilevkes who not only pioneered our present settlements in Palestine, but were among the first to join in the revolutions against the Tsars — and more recently, to stand up for a free Spain!'

In order to lighten the atmosphere, and perhaps to appease those who were looking to blot out our past, Singer announced: ‘Friends, permit me to relate an anecdote. An ever-hopeful Kasril once paid a visit to our well-known Monsieur Rothschild. “Sir,” he began, “I have a scheme which will grant you eternal life.” “Let's have it,” the magnate commanded. “Well, I am a businessman,” said the Kasril. “One hundred dollars and it's all yours.” Rothschild handed him the money. “So, what is your scheme?” he demanded. The Kasril replied: “Sir, establish yourself in Kasrilevke. I am the notary there, so was my father before me, and my father's father before him. I can assure you, you won't find a single rich man in our books who ever died in Kasrilevke.”'

Singer's story caused some merriment in our theatre group, and eased the tension.
The Divorce
was a huge triumph. It brought a lot of people together and was responsible for a good crop of successful marriages.

After that we staged a revue, and among the pieces performed was one I had written, titled ‘Aliyah', in honour of the Hebrew-speaking Italian sailors who risked their lives ferrying Jews in dilapidated boats across the dangerous murky waters of the Mediterranean.

Finally, before our theatre's curtain fell for good, Majer Ceprow directed that mysterious classic of Jewish literature,
The Golem
by H. Leivick, about a powerful artificial creature made by Rabbi Judah Loew of Prague through kabbalistic magic. This play was very much in theme with our postwar mood. Its central question reflected on our relation to the Gentile world, a world that had forsaken us. Ceprow, who had dreamt of playing Rabbi Loew, directed superbly but could not fulfil his desire, for fate called him to Brussels before the play opened; Rabbi Loew was played by Skurecki. Sitting in the audience, I couldn't push the violinist's solemn warning from my mind.

There can be no more miracles
...

 

 
Wedding
 

Mendel Singer's thoughts about Sholem Aleichem's Kasrilevke found a profound echo in my heart. From our first meeting I had felt a closeness to that unassuming, learned man.

As we were walking to a wedding to which all the inhabitants of the Santa Maria camp were invited, he spoke to me about his understanding of our history. ‘You see,' he said, pursing his lips, ‘not every Jew is necessarily Jewish. A Jew is
a physical being, whereas Jewishness is a spiritual thing. This means, my friend, that an individual Jew can become an antisemite, a Fascist, even a Nazi, but Jewishness — as a living ideal of universal brotherhood — is in eternal conflict with anything life-denying. Whatever has been touched by our spirit has somehow been transformed.

‘I once heard a story,' he went on, ‘about a black canvas that hung in a city gallery. Nobody understood this painting, until a young boy came along and pointed to a tiny white dot near the corner. “Look,” he said, “a star!” And suddenly all that blackness had a meaning.'

There was a piano-accordion, wine, a little food, and of course dancing. A postwar marriage between two survivors carried an exhilarating sadness: there were so many guests, and no one to invite. The bride and groom, 23-year-old Wladka and 21-year-old Janek, stood all alone under the
chuppah
like two forlorn children. Everyone here was a relative, and no one was. ‘You know,' said Singer, ‘Wladka told me she doesn't believe in God any more, yet she felt she had to have a religious wedding. Funny, isn't it, how people think?'

‘Not really,' I replied. ‘Some people might reject God but can't live without religion.'

‘Wladka was an only child,' Singer said, taking me aside. ‘She lost her parents when she was sixteen. Her father was a doctor, mobilized at the outbreak of war; she never saw him again. Much later she was informed that he had been killed by the NKVD at Katyn. Her mother, after being pack-raped by a village mob, was sold to the Gestapo. Wladka ran away, hid in a forest, survived on mushrooms and wild berries.
One night she heard footsteps so she climbed up into a tree. It was unbearably cold and windy up there, yet she held on with all her might — but she grew dizzy, her hands grew numb, she let go and fell to the ground. A man stood above her, training a gun against her face. “I am Wladka,” she managed, trembling with fright. They remained like that for an eternity. When the man finally spoke, there was warmth in his voice. “I am Janek,” he said.'

After the exchange of vows Janek made a speech. He had been a restless youth, he explained, from a township in which sixty percent of the people were Jews. His grandfather was a highly respected citizen and a friend of the priest. There was harmony between the Jews and the Gentile folk. Two days after the Germans invaded the town his grandfather was hanged, to the applause of the local populace. After that the boy's mother told him: ‘Janek, run, and live.' And so he did. He had not stopped running since.

Singer studied my face. ‘You know what's remarkable about survivors' stories?' he whispered. ‘They are like human beings: all so different, yet all so alike.'

When the speeches were over we began to sing — heartfelt Yiddish, Polish and Russian songs. How astonishing, I thought, that a people who had suffered so much depravity could still sing.

Suddenly, without warning, Singer raised his arms for silence and pointed to me. ‘Listen, everyone,' he cried. ‘My friend will read some of his verses for you!' His eyes called me to the task. I was quite hesitant: public reading was something I dreaded. But there was this petite girl in the crowd whom I wanted to impress, so I made bold and took
out some poems that I always carried around with me. Eyeing the small brunette, with her high cheekbones and fine bosom, I stepped forward: ‘I'll read a short poem of mine dedicated to my hometown poet, Yitzhak Katzenelson, who, just before his brutal demise, wrote “The Song of the Murdered Jewish People”:

‘
Let me sing in the simplest vein

Of all that pains my heart;

A Yiddish song that has lost its name,

The song of a murdered bard.

Let me sing in the simplest vein

Of days that had no years;

Of days that hid their face in shame

Drenched in unshed tears.

Yet let me sing in the simplest vein

Of mankind's eternal spring;

The song that rises above the flame

Will never cease to sing.'

My short lyric received decent acclaim, but not from the one I sang for. When Singer came over to shake my hand, I asked: ‘What's the name of that little girl in the burgundy short-sleeved dress?'

‘That's Esther. She runs our library.'

In fact I had seen her in the library but had been too shy to make contact. Emboldened by my poetic performance, I invited her to dance. I had never been much of a dancer,
however, and Esther soon excused herself and left me in the middle of the floor. I had chosen the moment unwisely, forgetting that the tango was regarded, where I came from, as the epitome of the discourse of the middle class, to which I had never belonged. Esther obviously did.

But I was not a man who gave up easily.

 

 
Marriage