K. E. FRANZOS’ “JEWS OF BARNOW”
George MacDonald was a novelist of distinction. When an English translation of Ein Kampf ums Recht appeared (under the title For the Right), MacDonald wrote an introduction. “Not having been asked to do so, I write this preface from admiration of the book.” It was a significant fact, he continued, that the generation had produced a man capable of such an ideal as the book represented. It was a work which substituted for the “half wisdom” of the cry “art for art’s sake” the whole wisdom of the cry “art for truth’s sake.” And MacDonald concluded as he began: “I have seldom, if ever, read a work of fiction that moved me with so much admiration.” Mr. Gladstone, too, was among the enthusiastic eulogists of the novel.
Its author was Karl Emil Franzos, to whom we owe, besides that masterpiece of his genius, For the Right (1887), also the less mature work of his earlier years, The Jews of Barnow (1877). He will always be remembered for a saying of his which appeared in his first-published book, a narrative of travel-sketches, Aus Halb-Asien (1876): Jedes Land hat die Juden die es verdient (“Every country has the Jew that it deserves”). Macaulay said much the same thing, but less epigrammatically, nearly half a century earlier. It is not a completely satisfactory generalization, but it is an effective counter to the cruel theory that every Jew gets the country he deserves. “It is not the fault of the Polish Jews that they are less civilized than their brethren in the faith in England, Germany, and France.” Writing this sentence forty years ago, Franzos used the word “civilized” in a narrow sense. All that it really amounted to was that the conventions of Barnow were not those of Berlin. Franzos makes quite a grim problem out of the Barnow Jewess’s revolt against the Scheitel, without seeing that in point of fact the revolt was only one, and an early, phase of the new feminist movement which was to spread all over the world.
What were Franzos’ qualifications for becoming the historian of a Podolian ghetto? He lived out his boyhood there; and he never lost the Jewish sympathies generated by his early experiences. Years afterwards, when he was at the summit of his renown, the most famous Jewish littérateur of his age, he associated himself heartily at Berlin with the work being done for Israel in Russia. The Barnow of his tales was the Czortkow of his youth. Whether he, therefore, presented a true picture is not so certain. He himself was convinced that, though he strove to give poetic value to the scenes, he none the less depicted the scenes accurately. “I have never permitted my love of the beautiful to lead me into the sin of falsifying the facts and conditions of life, and am confident that I have described this strange and outlandish mode of existence precisely as it appeared to me.” Franzos’ claim that he drew a sincere picture cannot be disputed, but a sincere picture is not necessarily an accurate one. Things may not “appear” to one truly. How stands it with Franzos?
The Barnow of the tale is a gloomy little town, and the houses of its ghetto small and dirty. Yet it boasts the great white mansion of its millionaire; it has its real spring days when the air is deliciously soft and warm. And it knows how to keep the Sabbath, how to welcome the bride with an emotion which stirs its spirit to the very depths. But all the passion is expended on the adoration of the Divinity. “The same race whose genius gave birth to the Song of Songs—the eternal hymn of love—and to whom the world owes the story of Ruth, the most beautiful idyl of womanhood ever known—has now, after a thousand years of the night of oppression and wandering, learned to look on marriage as a mere matter of business, by which to secure some pecuniary advantage, and as a means of preventing the chosen of the Lord from dying off the face of the earth.” The author grows more and more indignant as he writes: “These men know not what they do—they have no suspicion of the sin of which they are guilty in thus acting.”
This, for Franzos, was the tragedy of Barnow. It is the theme of several of his tales. Sometimes it is the boy, sometimes the girl, who rides a-tilt against the paternal choice of a mate. The father selects for his son or daughter the most pious and wealthy partner available. They will not know each other, but what of that? They will have plenty of time to make acquaintance after marriage. One Barnow father thus defends the system: “We don’t look upon the chicken as wiser than the hen. And, thank God, we know nothing of love and all that kind of nonsense. We consider that two things are alone requisite when arranging a marriage, and these are health and wealth. The bride and bridegroom in this case possess both.” Franzos obviously regards this justification as one of the “outlandish” features of Barnow’s manners. But were he alive to-day, he would recognize that Moses Freudenthal, the Barnow father who thus argues, was anticipating the latest formula of Eugenics! The novelist, however, remorselessly sees only the tragedy and not the amenities of the system. From the side of the man, in the story Nameless Graves, Franzos put it thus: “As a general rule, the long-haired Jewish youth never even thinks of any girl until his father tells him that he has chosen a wife for him. He sometimes sees his bride for the first time at betrothal, but in a great many cases he does not see her until his marriage-day; and then, whether she pleases him or not, he makes up his mind to get used to her, and generally succeeds.” But the Barnow young men turn and look at Lea as she walks down the street—“a thing hitherto unknown.” Even in the Klaus, when “quiet, dreamy, and very dirty Talmudists bent over their heavy folios, her name was sometimes mentioned, followed by many a deep sigh.” A revolution in male manners, undoubtedly.
On the other side, things are even worse in Barnow. If the men actually think of choosing for themselves, the women go and do likewise. And with fatal results. Half educated, feasting on surreptitious and precocious courses of the works of Paul de Kock, fascinated by Christian lovers, the girls of Barnow go through agitating experiences, sometimes heading for the rocks, always wrecking the harmony of the home. Esther and Chane differ only in externals; the one openly defies Mrs. Grundy, the other, in appearance only, obeys her. But both are led by passion to kick over the traces; both are treated by Franzos as victims of the loveless marriage system. Esterka Regina makes renunciation, but her last act was to write to the lover—a Jew this time—whom she had renounced, practically to confess to him that her marriage had been a failure. She had chosen the course mapped out by her parents, not from motives of obedience, but because her ignorant bringing-up had unfitted her for the position she would have had to occupy had she followed the dictates of her heart.
I have hinted above my doubts whether Franzos drew for us a correct picture of Barnow conditions. Amid all the realistic touches, here and there one comes across evidence of defective vision. He painted Barnow as he saw it, but he did not see it as it was. His father was district physician, a real friend of his fellow-Jews, but not living their life. The son saw Galician Jewish life from an aloof point of view. It is significant that in one of his tales he confuses the Friday eve with the Saturday night prayers. It is a slip with no serious consequences, but it does reveal the limitations of Franzos’ knowledge. None of his tragic heroines strikes so convincing a note as does, for instance, Bernstein’s graciously pathetic Voegele. Bernstein ceased to be a Jew, while Franzos remained faithful. Spiritual fidelity, however, does not necessarily carry with it realistic artistry.
HERZBERG’S “FAMILY PAPERS”
Wilhelm Herzberg was a victim to the world’s sensitiveness. And a queer sensitiveness it is! You may abuse a man as much as you like, and as unfairly as you like, while he is alive. But you must not speak harsh, even if they be true, things of him when he is recently dead. De mortuis nil nisi bonum! After a decent interval, criticism may resume operations. But for the hour you may only say soft things of the departed.