“With footsteps marking roundabout paths”: Jewish poetry on Crimea

Abstract

Published within two years of each other in the early 1920s, the Hebrew poet Shaul Tshernikhovski’s sonnet sequence “Crimea” and the Yiddish poet Perets Markish’s sonnet sequence “Chatyr‐Dag” are important studies in the image and significance of wandering in contemporary Jewish literature. Crimea holds a powerful interest for these two poets as a locus of discussion about land and territory, about the connection (or lack thereof) of Jews to a landscape that is in a sense “beyond the Pale,” both familiar and exotic, and a place of personal escape or refuge in these poets’ own biographies. Moreover, their conscious engagement with the great Eastern European literary landmarks of Crimea –Alexander Pushkin’s “The Fountain of Bakhchisaray” and Adam Mickiewicz’s “Crimean Sonnets” – makes these important texts for understanding Jewish cultural movement in the early twentieth century.

Keywords:

• Crimea
• Shaul Tshernikhovski
• Perets Markish
• Alexander Pushkin
• Adam Mickiewicz

Notes

1. Poliak, “Crimea,” 1103–6.

2. Binyon, Pushkin, 121.

3. By one account, it was “the most popular work published in his lifetime” (Bethea and Davydov, “Pushkin’s Life,” 15).

4. Kalinowska, Between East and West, 16–17. Though Polish criticism has given extensive attention to Mickiewicz’s “Crimean Sonnets” since their first appearance in print, Kalinowska’s chapter (“Travel, Orientalism, and East–West Dialogue in Adam Mickiewicz’s Sonnets”) is one of the few and most sustained analysis of these poems in English.

5. Kalinowska, Between East and West, 19.

6. That is, the two structural halves of this kind of sonnet, the octave composed of two quatrains and the sestet of two tercets.

7. Kalinowska, Between East and West, 29.

8. Silberschlag, Saul Tschernichowsky, 26; Klausner, Shaul Tshernikhovski, 152–3.

9. See, for example, Klausner, Shaul Tshernikhovski, 164; Likhtenbaum, Shaul Tshernikhovski, 28.

10. Silberschlag, Saul Tschernichowsky, 28; Tshernikhovski, Imanuel ha‐romi.

11. Shneer, “Peretz Markish,” 175–6; see also Hrushovsky et al., A Shpigl af a Shteyn, 751–6.

12. Kalinowska, Between East and West, 21.

13. Ibid., 25.

14. Stankiewicz, “Sound and Sight,” 496 (“The progressive journey in space is thus at each point stalled by a retrospective journey in time, and under the surface of the outer, exotic world flows an undercurrent of the poet’s innermost longings and aspirations”).

15. Kalinowska, Between East and West, 30.

16. This despite the fact that, in Klausner’s assessment, “Thus are combined in ‘Crimean Sonnets’ Jewishness and humanity, old and new, wonderful memories of the past and gloomy feelings of the present, and they become a simple wonderful poetic garland” (Klausner, Shaul Tshernikhovski, 167, emphasis my own).

17. Kurzweil, Bialik u‐tshernikhovski, 293.

18. Tshernikhovski, Shirim chadashim. All translations unless otherwise indicated are my own. I have kept them as literal as possible. I would like to thank Professor Glenda Abramson for her suggestions on my Hebrew translations. Whatever felicities there are in them are hers; whatever errors are wholly my own. (“bakhtshisaray, ha‐namt? bakhtshisaray, hakhi / lo gilu lakh ha‐sod aden kehal mulayikh? / bi‐fros ha‐layil ba‐har et kesamav gam alayikh / hadji ish peli ba va‐rchov ba‐shvil, ba‐schi. // mi‐tsriach ze al yad ha‐ksarket kol shel bekhi / yishama – ve‐kara be‐shem kol gedudei farashayikh / ha‐noflim el ha‐tsar, el machne ma’avidayikh, / u‐va’u ve‐vigdei srad u‐ve‐tsilvei fras u‐mechi. […] ‘hoy oru ach et ach! ve‐ish re’o yachrim! / ki oy la‐am, she‐ein be‐olmo lo akh tseriach, ve‐shichet libo le‐zar ve‐zaro al kol tsechiach.’”)

19. Line 9 of “Bakhchisaray.”

20. Kurzweil, Bialik u‐tshernikhovski, 290; see also Sadan, Bein din le‐cheshbon, 32–4.

21. This word, tavriyah, is the older Greek‐derived name for Crimea (the native tribe was the Tauri). Use of this classicising variant emphasises the grand cultural and historical tableau into which he organically tries to fit Jewish life.

22. Note the explicit reference to Genesis 1:2.

23. The chief Cossack camp.

24. Tshernikhovski, Shirim, 149–50. (“ve‐ru’ach shel tugah charishit merachefet al penei ha‐aravah, / shirat yegon ha‐olmim, amukah, ilemet u‐marah, / sichot olamot she‐hayu, ta’alumot atidot ha‐yamim, / yamim yavo’u. … nod’ah me’od ha‐aravah, u‐ve‐luchot toldot ha‐adam, / harchek me’od, sham, al ketseh gevul ha‐emet ve‐ha‐agadah, / me’ulaf shmah be‐anan shel pil’ei fela’ot u‐netsurot. / parsim poh nilchamu im ha‐skitim, achareihem yidodu / mishpechot ha‐petshenegim u‐vnei ha‐polovtsim le‐shivteihem, / achar nishpekhu foh demei kozakim ve‐tatarim, / chalfu, nagozu ha‐yamim et yig’u ne’ot ha‐aravah, / yam shel asavim u‐desha’im mavrikim u‐mefitsim nichocham, / mini gevulot budjak ad le‐vo yam ha‐kaspi ha‐gadol, / ve‐amim kashim ma’ahilim al sefot ha‐nechalim ba‐aravah, / bolmim suseihem ha‐pera’im alei merchavyat ha‐shdeimot. / nish’aru akh kivroteihem; ha‐bamot ha‐bodedim, ha‐ramot! / dumam yabitu me‐al penei ha‐bamot ha‐psilim ha‐nugim, / chidot ha‐even ha‐karah. / afikei ha‐aviv ha‐pzizim / garfu kol roshem ve‐khol tsel shel ha‐skitim meitivei ha‐rekhev. / ru’ach nashvah bi‐rshamim shel benei ha‐polovtsim – u‐tefitsem, / shaktah le‐olamim ha‐‘setsh’ ve‐ne’elmu ha‐tupim bi‐msibot / ganei gei bachtshisaray, ve‐nimle’u ne’ot ha‐aravah / meged shamayim ve‐tal, va‐adi kamot zahav levushan.”)

25. Kul‐Oba is the site near Kerch in eastern Crimea of a Scythian kurgan, or burial mound.

26. “bi yashev rucho yam, yam kadosh, yam ha‐kechol… / ve‐rei’ach bari va, belil itran dag u‐fitrah; / esh’afah, ervah ad…hoy shirat oz, mi fitrah, / im gevurot naskhu vah o hed manginat shekhol? // ze kolo va bi‐dvir herakles u‐vi‐mchol / satatei ‘tel‐kul‐ob’ ve‐al ‘kivrah shel dmitrah’, / yari’a shiro ze ad bo ha‐yom u‐vitrah / yabeshet al ha‐yesod ve‐haytah li‐me’i chol.”

27. The standard counterpart of autochthony is allochthony, that is, coming from a place other than the one in which it is found. My coinage in effect stresses a synthesis of the two, the kind of layering (in time and space) which was so important to Tshernikhovski.

28. “kvar charav ha‐agam ve‐dalal mazrek shvo, / ha‐charmon ve‐ha‐gan – she‐sugru az mi‐bo – / yehalel be‐einav zar, ve‐ha‐sho’er hu mevi’o.”

29. See Kalinowska, Between East and West, 42, for political interpretations of these symbols.

30. Ibid., 41. Additionally, one important feature of this orientalist style of writing was the use of footnotes (Kalinowska, Between East and West, 19, 58 n. 5). Tshernikhovski also makes extensive use of footnotes in his own text.

31. See especially Mickiewicz’s “Bakhchisaray” (“Bakczysaraj”).

32. “yipagesh tsel et tsel shel miryam ve‐shel zaremah” – Tshernikhovski’s footnote reads, “The two heroines of Pushkin’s ‘The Fountain of Tears’,” that is, “The Fountain of Bakhchisaray.”

33. Yaniv, Ha‐baladah ha‐ivrit, 113: “Tshernikhovski recognized the affinity of the Hebrew literature of his time to Russian literature, and in his article ‘Pushkin and our Mechitsah’ he expressed explicit opinions on that question. In his words his generation had a ‘Russian School’ which encompassed ‘the majority of Jewish writers, certainly those born in Russia, among those who write in Hebrew, those who write in Russian, and those who write in Yiddish.’ It is possible to investigate this School only relying upon its approach to the Russian literary community of which it is a part: ‘Whoever wants to write about the development of the accomplishments of the best of our writers during the last two generations will be unable not to mention Pushkin and will be forced to begin his investigation and study first of all with Pushkin and his followers. He who doesn’t know Pushkin (and after that Frug) will never understand the secret of the development of the members of the Russian School: Manne, Bialik, Shimonovitsh, Fichman, L. Yaffe, etc.’ Tshernikhovski saw Pushkin as the mediator between Western literature and Hebrew literature.”

34. “aval lo sal’i hu! lo sal’i hu ve‐lo kam / liy‐hudah ami ze! hagam be‐rachvei tevel / bi‐ndudei me’ot dor hamon tsiyunei evel / nash’irah be‐khol atar, nafrenu ve‐nachalei dam. // akh nachnu, yorshei dam ha‐makabi – al har ram / be‐hakhna’at avdei rav ve‐khelev lumad chevel, / lo nakim dvir la‐sar ha‐mesayer et ha‐chevel / al gapei kivrot avot be‐kodshei kodshei am … akh shnayim odam sham! akh shnayim hem! u‐khe‐vo / ha‐mesayer ve‐sach la‐hem: ‘u‐le‐mi ir he‐choravot?’ / az ya’anu kha‐tsav: – “akh la‐nu hi ve‐la‐avot, / af edim gal va‐gal ba‐eimek asher poh!” // u‐le‐kortov shirah im tidroshu: “henah vo!” / machrozet ketav arav ba‐even nechetsavot / al kever marmar kar tesaprenah lakh nisgavot / al ahavat bat ha‐kan, she‐be‐onyah nachah vo.”

35. “u‐ve‐ein ba’ei mo’ed bi‐tefilah aluvah / hityachadu, parshu ketalayikh ba‐tom; / u‐shtei marganiyot ha‐omrot: alu vah! // (mi yode’a, me‐ein higi’u halom) / mitrapkot alayikh ke‐tinok ba‐chalom / u‐khe‐tsipor chavushah mitchabtah al keluvah.”

36. “akh ba‐arov ha‐yom itmatach al ha‐chol / viy‐halekh raglah, kaf va‐kaf – dal chadal onim – / mit’atef talit kulah sechok shel yakintonim.”

37. “ve‐chashrat avim lo im berakim – tsenif shel chag.”

38. “tshaterdag! shpinen hoykhn bargishe dir tshalmes vayse.”

39. “sevavani gal ha‐tsur, ma’akashei sela’im, se’ifim, / kol mikshe eifer kar, chashilei vered kefor; / shen pogshah shen va‐tsur, ha‐nokvim leil va‐or, / u‐khe‐mikhtav elohim al arpelei ziv makhsifim. // shur: ha‐arafel za!…taltalim si’at re’ifim / mitrapkim al kol shen u‐megashrim al pi bor, / ka‐nil’eh asher nach u‐mefager la‐chzor. / mi‐ma’amakim ba kol nesher, tsivchat grifim.”

40. “od tsorchim ha‐nesharim al kekeneiz – / ein zot ki odenu makhchil bein harim, / ki se’ifav od koltim et shirat ha‐nesharim / u‐re’amim yetanu lo evlam ba‐chaziz. // ki omer hu shirat im nachal u‐fziz / ha‐zeramim, be‐shigyonam ba‐sa’ar nigarim, / viy‐naser ba‐marom im avim nigrarim, / u‐khe‐tsipor agadot al kinah – ka‐ziz.”

41. It is described as “a bird standing up to its ankles in the water and its head in the sky.”

42. Translated by Dorothea Prall Radin, in Mickiewicz, Adam Mickiewicz, 71.

43. Mickiewicz, Wybór Pism, 61, 420.

44. The choice of Chatyr‐Dag as a site of heady revelations has a literary pedigree. As Stankiewicz notes about Mickiewicz’s thirteenth sonnet, “Chatyr‐Dag” (“Czatyrdah”), which is spoken by Mirza: “The sensual eroticism of the oriental night is matched in Sonnet XIII by a picture of trembling submissiveness of the Moslem man (‘drżąc muślimin całuje’) in front of the mighty peak, Czatyrdah, which sits eternally immobile and mute (‘zawsze głuchy, nieruchony’) between heaven and earth. Small and humble oriental man has no access to God and his universe, and it is only Czatyrdah, the padishah and drogman (interpreter) of creation that translates for him the incomprehensible language in which God speaks to his children (‘słuchasz tylko, co mówi Bóg do przyrodzenia’)” (Stankiewicz, “Sound and Sight,” 499–500).

45. Oyslender, Veg ayn – veg oys, 117.

46. Ibid., 117.

47. Ibid., 118.

48. That is: I. “sea voyage” (sonnets 2, 3, 4); II. “ruins and tombs” (sonnets 6, 7, 8, 9, 17); III. “Crimean mountains” (sonnets 11, 12, 13); and IV. “precipices” (sonnets 15, 16) (Stankiewicz, “Sound and Sight,” 494–5).

49. Ibid., 495.

50. Markish, Stam. All translations unless otherwise indicated are my own. There are 24 untitled sonnets in the cycle, to which I will refer by number. (“mit trit mit tseykhndike, tshaterdag, fun umvegn gevelt, / genen ikh tsu dem zoym fun dayn gelatet‐khmaredikn mantl; / – o, porush shteynerner, bavaksener mit mandlen, / vosere shteynerike bsures vartstu fun ek‐velt?… // bavilikter fun shturem, af taynes mit der zun geshvelt, / arufgeleygt af dir der himl brokhedik, vi af a bkhor iz; / – tsebaylter tshaterdag, mit kop fartroyt di zunike midboryes, / host nokh nit oysgetseylt dos bloye shterndike feld?… // vos zestu, tshaterdag, in di tseviklt‐vayte bloye roymen? / vos leyenstu in dr’heykh in di tseshternte megiles? / ikh gey tsu dir itst, shtern‐seyer, uf farshikert fun a zunendikn shlag; // mayn teyve shtel ikh nit af dir, mayn teyve kh’hob farlozt fun benkenish un troymen, / nor ruik zaynen dayne kni, dayn rukn azoy troymerish un shtil iz, – / ikh vel zikh do mit shtilkayt ontrunen fun dayne aksl, tshaterdag!”)

51. This is a concept I have been developing to refer to those recurrent words and phrases in a poet’s lexicon in whose repeated use are concentrated the thematic content and ideas being worked on and experimented with in more than a single poem, or small group of poems, but in the poet’s larger poetic project.

52. Alushta is a Crimean town on the coast a few miles southeast of Chatyr‐Dag; two of Mickiewicz’s Crimean Sonnets are dedicated to it.

53. “af knien halt a barg “alushta” […] fun eyn zayt mit a kop an opgegoltn – der metshet, / fun tsveyter – shtiblekh‐shpilkes in zayn layb arayngeshtokhn, / der mula shrayt un ruft, un gorglt mit gebet / a gantse nakht af dr’erd mit oysgedreyte knokhn… […] mit hayzlekh totershe fardekt iz dayn geshvolener tsefisn / un veldlekh ganvenen zikh, vi tsegeyners, shtil, mit shvartse berd fun lak, / un ikh, dayn umru trink, dayn shteynerikn, tshaterdag!”

54. Markish, Shveln, 67–79.

55. Oyslender, Veg ayn – veg oys, 112. Later he maintains, “Who can forget them, the formidable layers of concentrated coloration which are heaped up upon the pages of Thresholds, like those mountain cliffs that must figure in that book of Markish’s? Who will, in those enormous masses of images, not recognize the barbarically unbridled imagination of Markish’s, which is, in its supernaturalism, so natural; in its legendariness so believable; in its formliness so unformed?” (ibid., 115). Markish’s contemporary, the poet Dovid Hofshteyn (1889–1952), also found the image of feldzn attractive as a locus of ideological positioning. See, for example, his poem “We Originate from Rocks!” first published in 1919; here is the second stanza:

We originate from Rocks

That have shattered

The yoke of the hardening standing‐still –

We go –

And only desolate forests

Can stop us …

We are the first

In the folds of the winds,

Bound to the whirlwinds,

Besistered to the waves,

Bebrothered to the storm –

To the East, to the West, to the North, to the South!

“mir shtamen fun feldzn, / vos hobn tsebrokhn / dem yokh fun dem glivernem shteyen – / mir geyen – / un velder nor viste / undz kenen farhaltn… / mir zenen di ershte / in faldn fun vintn, / mit vikhers gebundn, / mit khvalyes geshvestert, / gebrudert mit shturem – / ken mizrekh, ken mayrev, ken tsofn, ken dorem!”) (Hofshteyn, Lider, 82).

56. Oyslender, Veg ayn – veg oys, 118.

57. “un traybt er khvalyes, tshaterdag, tsu dir, vi helish brenendike indn.”

58. “mit pantsers zilberne zikh koyklen khvalyes, fregndik tsu dir dem veg, / af reder shpiglene, mit pompes shoym.”

59. The metaphor of nature‐as‐pilgrim is also found elsewhere in Markish. To take but one example, in his famous nightmarish Expressionist poema about the Ukrainian pogroms of 1919 – The Heap (Di kupe) – he refers to “wind‐pilgrims” (vintn‐pilgrimen), though there with a very different intent.

60. “shlepn dir zikh, tshaterdag, af knien nokh tselozte berglekh fun der vaytn, / vi shleyfn oysgefaldevet tsufisn – kukn zey arunter; / arum dayn shtumer groys tseshtelte af der vakh fun ale zaytn / tsekneytshte zoymen fun dayn fel mit pakhed haltn zey dir unter … // un vegn ongegreyt dir tsu badinen lign oysgeleygt vi shlangen, / un toln vayzn bristn dir – di oysgekeyte grine.”

61. “tshaterdag! ganvenen tsu dir zikh makhnes khmares, / un viklen dir mit shvartse sametn arum dayn shteynerikn kop; / tsu dayn farshteynert harts, tsu dayne brist fargliverte zey nidern arop / un bodn shtil zikh in dayn groysn shteynerikn tsar oys … // vi shvartse foyglen nakhtishe arum dir dreyen zey zikh shtume, / vi oyskukers aroysgeshvebt fun nakhtisher fun shvartser hoykh; / mit shvartse federn dayn naket tapn zey, dayn hoyln boykh, / un shvebn op, un fun dosnay, nokh shvartser lozn zikh arop, un kumen.”

62. Markish, Shveln, 67. (“in dr’hoykh, bay di tselozte felzn‐berg tsukopn / shlept um a vint a shvartsn fligl fun a kro, / dort klaybt a khmare shtil a tropn tsu a tropn, – / gefunen hot zikh dort ir shtile heym di ru.”)

63. “un greser verstu, tshaterdag, un oysgevaksener un breyter, / s’farmekt zikh bislekhvayz dayn onheyb un dayn sof, / n’glaykh vi mit shvartse federn farshtokhn vert dayn shteynerike hoyt.”

64. This translation is according to Kronfeld, On the Margins of Modernism, 204; for a discussion of this poem and its significance see also pp. 202–8; Shneer, “Peretz Markish,” 175–6. The text is from Markish, Shveln, 24. (“veys ikh nit, tsi kh’hob a heym, / tsi kh’hob a fremd, / tsi kh’bin a onheyb, tsi a sof.”)

65. Markish, Shveln, 55. (“kh’veys nit, vu ikh hoyb zikh on, / kh’veys nit vu z’mayn sof … // in vistn kholel fun eyn‐sof, / hob ikh farblondzhet tsvishn veltn, / kh’hob zikh forlorn tsvishn tsaytn, / kh’hob zikh fardreyt.”)

66. In contrast to what applies to the human subject, this could be a Tshernikhovski‐like model of quasi‐autochthony in nature, where “seeking one’s branch, one’s tree” is a search for true belonging, of the place for roots.

67. “un ganvenen zikh kvalekhlekh aleyn tsu vayntroybdike toln shtil aroys, / vi kales zilberne, vos du, o, tshaterdag, mit kishef host gefangen; / zey kushn zikh mit tsvaygn shtil, zey redn zikh di hertser oys / un tsien mit zikh lange shnirelekh levoneshe gezangen… // un zingen kvalekhlekh af gleklekh, shpiln rinshtoklekh af tatsn, / un yedere zukht op zayn tsvayg, un yedere zukht op zayn boym; / un yedere dertseylt mit benkshaft fun gefangenisher heym, / vi s’lebt zikh, tshaterdag, bay dir in di farputste untererdishe palatsn.”

68. Especially the “Tatar Song” (“Tatarskaya Pesnya”) of the harem.

69. “tshaterdag! shpinen hoykhn bargishe dir tshalmes vayse, / fun shneyen‐ershtlingen, vi vayse matelekh, vos yogn zikh un loyfn, / zey bindn dir arum dayn altn kop iber di shleyfn / un klepn oys fun dir a bargishe, an alte mayse … // un leygn zey zikh af dir oys, vi shtiklekh zun tsebreklte af oysyes, / un kumen vintn bargishe zikh shtil tsunoyf af dayne shteyner, / geshteynt, gehartevet dayn layb vos hobn mit di hent aleyn nokh, / un vos gedenken nokh biz itst di ershte reges fun breyshis.”

70. “hot, tshaterdag, zikh shoyn a heysherik a loz geton af dayn medine, / af dayne ashike un zaftik‐ongefilte beres; / un triknt zun, un hits batogedike zoygndik un shver iz / un ayngegesn unter dayne negl hobn yashtsherkes zikh grine.”

71. A kind of low‐lying plant, possibly a fern.

72. “atsevet shatkanit me’alefet ha‐tel, / demi tsulah cholemet al sivchei almugah; / u‐leta’ot morikot al ge‐derekh, ha‐sugah / pashtinah sarvanit u‐khemehah le‐tsel.”

73. “di toters tuen gleklekh oys fun ferd, di bloye kreln me tsebindt, / un ale veysn shoyn in dorf, az ongekumen iz a briv fun stambul … // zikh opruen veln di ferd, zikh oysshlofn veln di vegn, / in gortn dreyt zikh troyerik arum a fete lam, / zi veyst, az morgn iz bay zey ‘kurban‐beyram’, / nor yeder bletele zi shmekt, bay yedn darf zi epes fregn … // un falt di nakht af toterishe shvartse hayzlekh, / farvigt di vayntroybdike toln mit di gertner, / nor ergets, benkendik, der mula rayst af shtrik di toterishe ru …”

74. “ikh vel, farbaygeyer, dikh haynt shoyn nit farshlofn, / haynt ale oytsres shtilkayt ikh tseefn un tsebind; / dort yogt zikh afn yam nokh vayse shepselekh – a vint, / un ikh – ikh veys nokh nit aleyn nokh vos ikh bin aher gelofn.”

75. Norich, The Homeless Imagination, 31–2.