Jacob Gordin (1853-1909) was the most renowned of all the writers for the Yiddish stage, yet his career as a playwright began only after he had come to this country from his native Russia, at the age of thirty-eight. He started out by adapting for the Yiddish stage works by such dramatists as Lessing, Gorki, Tolstoy, Hauptmann, and Strindberg, and then proceeded to write plays of his own, among which were the Yiddishe King Lear and Gott, Mensh, und Taivl. His fame spread to the non-Yiddish-speaking world, and, as we see from the letter by Simeon Strunsky (1879-1948) which we print below, efforts were made, all inconclusive, to get Gordin produced on the English-speaking stage.

Strunsky himself was born in Russia but was brought up and educated in this country. It was after the time of this letter, when he was employed by a publisher, that he won fame as a journalist on the New York Evening Post, and then as an essayist with the New York Times.

Gordin’s letter to Mr. Wagnalls of Funk and Wagnalls, who were then engaged in the publication of the Jewish Encyclopedia, was written in reply to a request for his views on the theater. It seems to have been written originally in Russian—the language Gordin was even more at home in than Yiddish—and then translated.

Both letters are reprinted here by permission of the Yiddish Scientific Institute, and originally appeared in Volume IX (1954) of the Yivo Annual of Jewish Social Science, together with letters to Gordin from the American poet Edwin Markham, from Markham’s secretary, and from S. Zinberg, the editor of the Russian Jewish Encyclopedia. The introductory note and annotations to this chapter of letters were provided by Dr. Jacob Shatzky, a member of Yivo—ED.

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Dear Mr. Gordin:

May I venture to take up some minutes of your time on a subject which will probably task your patience as well? In varying degree the subject has been in my thoughts since I first made your acquaintance more than two years ago; it began to take definite form after the presentation of your Benefactors of the East Side¹ at the Grand Central Palace; the immediate occasion of my writing is the special production, at which I was present, of your Gott, Mensch und Teuffel at the Thalia on Friday last. I have not the least data for supposing that you have ever thought of writing for the English stage save the above-mentioned production of the Benefactors; yet the fact that you have been at pains to invite the attention of the non-Jewish world to your dramatic work makes me inclined to believe that the thought has probably entered your mind. If my supposition is wrong the remainder of this letter is futile; if, on the contrary, you ever have entertained such a desire my first point is made.

You may or may not know that on some occasions, in the course of private conversation, I have spoken in a spirit of criticism of some of your work (not of course that that will or should make any difference to you). You may or may not know, too, however, that I regard you as one of the most excellent of contemporary writers for the stage, with a mastery of the craft which I have seen equalled only in some of Pinero’s plays and those of the Germans; and that I have sincerely believed that, were it in any way possible for the extra-ghetto world to see your art embodied in a medium entirely comprehensible to them, you could not fail to take rank as America’s leading dramatist. Mind, I do not overlook the serious question as to whether your skill, working in a foreign medium, could produce such results as Mirele Efroth; that, however, is for you to feel and decide. Taking it for granted that the thing is possible, I have often felt how pale, thin, and tawdry the very best things we now have on the stage, the Fitch, Carton, Sidney Grundy society play,² would range beside a play of real life, written in earnest and with your mastery of technique. This long introduction, then, sums up in this: if you have ever thought of putting a play of yours on the American boards, will you make use of my services for that purpose?

(1) As translator. So many plays have been englished from the European languages that, on the face of it, there is no apparent reason why we may not have an English translation from the Yiddish of Jacob Gordin. Translation, of course, in the case of plays, there is no need to tell you, must mean, often, adaptation. As I think of them now, only plays dealing with the high society, which to a very large extent is the same in all countries, have escaped change in translation. Plays dealing with particularized national characteristics, as your best plays invariably do, to me seem largely untranslatable. Take your Gott, Mensch und Teuffel on Friday last. To how many of your foreign spectators did the play bear—I will not say a full meaning—but even, a just meaning? Say that the whole play had been translated for them how far could they have gone towards comprehending a character like “Lazar” or even much of the psychology of “Hershele”? Undeniably some of the richest points in the play must in any case be lost to a non-Jewish audience. In this I believe you will agree with me for the very reason that the themes of your plays are confessedly borrowed from the great secular literatures (Der jüdische Lear, Faust, Sappho, etc.) while it is upon the detailed realization of the leading motive in Jewish life and character that you concentrate your efforts. For these reasons it has seemed to me that translating one of your plays would be impracticable unless the play was written for the very purpose of being translated. If, therefore, you put aside the question of translating a Yiddish play of yours, might not I help you?

(2) As collaborator. You will probably smile at the term, and, I confess, there is not a little that is ridiculous in my proposing such a co-partnership to you—I who have done nothing at all in this field, to you, the successful master of the stage for more than ten years. Let me, nevertheless, state my arguments.

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Should you decide to make an appeal to the American public, the subject that seems inevitably logical for you to treat is the Jew in America. Him, unlike the Jew in Russia, the Gentiles know and, to that extent, of course, your audience is prepared for you. You cannot, however, I believe, take a theme dealing exclusively with the Jew of the ghetto because in him the outside world is not sufficiently interested and him they do not sufficiently know . . . a play exclusively of the East Side, would, in my opinion, still be a foreign play. On the other hand a play that should deal with the Jew as a whole, uptown as well as down, and the relations between the two, would be quite general enough. The subject, then, quite naturally suggests itself; the very subject you have treated—the Benefactors of the East Side. Of course, you have only my word for it, but the theme is one over which I had been puzzling a good long time before the production of your sketch and, perhaps, therefore, I may venture to point out in what way the little play struck me as unsuitable for the English stage if, indeed, you ever intended it for such a purpose. You have not invited my criticisms and they may possibly strike you as impertinent; but let me assure you that I enter upon them only because they are closely relevant to the matter in hand. I may say briefly: the play was too fierce, too farcical, and poorly translated. I am quite aware that it was just what you intended to make it, but my point is, that, being what it was, it would not be received by an American audience. It is quite evident that if you are to appeal to the general public you will have to make concessions; and I am fully aware what that means. You are a radical in religion and social theory and you have given a deeply ethical tinge to your works for the stage; perhaps you may not think it worth while, nay, even wrong to “appeal” to the American public; reasoning that everything which appealed to them would probably be to your intense dislike. And yet you, surely, as an artist, cannot deny that your auditor or spectator must be taken into account. May I tell you how I have thought of the very same subject of American Charity, as I have called it, of this subject of the relations between the East Side and the uptown Jew? You have seen one side of the picture: the blatant ignorance, the brutal delay, the ostentation, the silliness of the uptown benefactors. I have seen another side and a kindlier side (and it is in assuming a kindlier attitude that your first concession will have to be made); I have seen young men, classmates of mine at Columbia, Jews, go down on the East Side in the desire to do something for their fellow Jews. I admit that most of their work is useless, and much of it very funny, but, nevertheless, the motive has appealed to me and more than all the indestructible consciousness of race which has seemed to me a beautiful thing and a subject rich in dramatic material. Take this skeleton plot of mine; my hero, the son of a well-to-do uptown Jew, is a fine specimen of the race under favorable conditions; idealistic, clean-m/?/ded, clear-headed, a young Daniel Deronda, if you wish, without Deronda’s absurd priggishness, and though knowing himself a Jew, quite ignorant of Jewish life on the East Side, Jewish character, Jewish history even—in short, thoroughly Americanized as you call it. There on the East Side he gets his education; meets with the multifarious characters of the ghetto, finds out what the Jew is, what his life is, and in him awakens the national consciousness. He goes back uptown educated, a convert to Judaism, and a little on the way towards understanding the social problem.

There seems to me in this theme opportunities for an excellent comedy of which Acts I and IV would lie uptown and II and III downtown. An ignorant, money-grabbing father, a vulgar mother, professional charity men, etc. would afford enough scope for satire. The downtown scenes can be made beautiful with realistic portrayal, irony, and pathos. Bring the boy into contact with the types of men he has come down to educate, and will your satire be less effective, for being gentle, when it contrasts the innocent boy with the dreamers, scholars, agitators, thinkers, poets, he has come to save? You will of course have to make other concessions in the form of a pretty love story and all that, but is that not worth while in order to gain a hearing? You catch the point I am trying to make—that, for the sake of your kindliness to some, your American audience will forgive you much bitterness to others. Your satire may be quite effective though by no means so fierce. To sum up, it may mean that in method you may have to compromise but in substance I can see no concession. On the other hand you would undoubtedly produce a play vibrant with life, with humor, with action. . . .

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Why do you need me? In the first place, of course, for the help I can give you in the English form. You need not be told that translating a play, even where no changes are attempted, is something more than translating a statistical article or even a scientific work. I may be very much conceited but you will probably find very few people on the East Side who will place at your disposal as efficient a command of idiomatic English. I speak from knowledge for I have read much of the work that has been done on the East Side. You might, of course, find literary men among Americans who would work with you but they lack the essential acquaintance with the subject which I can’t help possessing. More than the mere work of translating, however, if your play is to deal in part with the uptown Jew, I, as one to whom, if I am not mistaken, you have sometimes referred as Americanized, might help you. As a matter of fact you are quite wrong about that; nevertheless, by temperament, I am able to take a point of view different from yours, as would to some extent be necessary in the construction of any play to please the American public. In addition, there is the acquaintance with American life which, to some degree, I possess. I do not speak here of literary ability. That in me is as yet unproven and you are not bound to take my word for it. What I expect to derive from such a co-partnership is, primarily, the experience. Frankly, if such a thing is possible, I want to learn some of the methods of the art from you. I have no doubt that the work would mean great profit to me. What it may mean to you, you of course will decide. At least I hope you will give the subject some moments of thought and favor me with a reply. Although I have spoken in detail my suggestion is in nature very general—that you make use of me, if you can, for entering the English field. Whatever considerations this may suggest to you, I should be glad to hear. If you should care to have me come to see you I should be only too happy.

Very truly yours,
Simeon Strunsky

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Dear Mr. Wagenhals³:

As to my biography, I refer you to the New International Encyclopedia, where quite a correct sketch of my life may be found. Also see The Spirit of the Ghetto by Hutchins Hapgood and the History of Jewish (Yiddish) Literature by Prof. Leo Wiener of Harvard.

You ask me to trace the origin of the Drama. I can not go into the details of the Genesis.

When Tolstoi published his Kreutzer Sonata it exerted a most profound influence upon all intelligent Russians. Those who were in the literary movement felt it all the more keenly. Upon me it produced an indelible impression.

Later I observed cases in the home life of Russians, where the book and its tendencies were vividly reflected in the family relations.

This suggested to me, a play, identical in the problem only, to that of Tolstoi’s Book.

The name “Kreutzer Sonata” was chosen equally for its attractiveness and its expressiveness.

The treatment evolved as follows: The racial traditions, the family pride, and the social conventions, which are, apparently, the safeguards of family honor, sometimes augment rather than check the development of a deep tragedy and bring about the destruction of the family.

1. Racial tradition—In the play, the Jewish father, the patriarch of the family, opposes the marriage of his daughter with a Christian, with a man of another race.
2. Family pride has to be presented at any cost, and to it, the parents sacrifice the happiness of their daughter.
3. To hush the scandal and hubbub, the daughter is forced to marry a man from lower social stratum.

First love crushed in the bud, and the consequences of the ill-match, are worked out in the drama. But what enhances the tragedy is the natural effect of immigration. Stranded on foreign soil, the old family traditions become entangled with those of the new and strange land—family happiness is threatened; degeneration and collapse follows.

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Thoughts on the Drama

Shakespeare taught us that the Drama should be the mirror of real life and of human nature.

The Drama is not for amusement, merely, but for instruction as well.

The greatest Educational Institution of the world is the theatre.

The theatre sociologizes great ideas, and brings men of widely different social ranks to one intellectual level.

Unquestionably, every drama must include elements of amusement, but its main object should be enlightment.

The Realism of a literary work is analytic in portrayal of characters and types of society.

In ideas is vested the synthetic power of a work of art.

Therefore, drama must be realistic in portrayal and synthetic in ideas.

A drama without realistic features and definite ideas, no matter how clever, is merely a doll, attractively dressed to amuse children.

There are great Romantic plays but their greatness lies in their synthetic ideas.

Cheap melodramas and “horse” plays have often greatest success, but this only indicates how much more of real solid work the serious drama has yet to accomplish. [Of course, the press agents did not utilize my letter.]

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¹ There is no mention of such a play in Gordin’s bibliographical list which is found in the Yivo archives. It was most probably a one-act play.

² References are to Clyde William Fitch, Richard Claude Carton, and Sydney Grundy. All three had had their plays produced on Broadway.

³ This should of course have been “Wagnalls.”

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