Yiddish and the Creation of Soviet Jewish Culture, 1918-1930 by David s> Shneer (review)

Abstract

352 SEER, 84, 2, 2006 piece, fastidious in establishing exact dates, yet curiously anecdotal in the informationit provides.In writingthe book, Ross had privilegedaccess to the church archiveswhich he quotes extensively (sometimesrunning into pages). But I miss the point of this, since again, treatmentof materialstends to yield gossipy 'tittle-tattle',ratherthan instructiveinsightsinto the fabricof Russian emigre life, and the role of the Church in forging a sense of community. Clearly,the foregroundtopic the historyof a parishchurchin a country that has played a centralrole in the developmentof Russianculture- throws up many relatedtopics.For sure,Ross does make a stabat these:the changing profile of the Russian emigre community as the nineteenth century progressed ,mutual stereotypingbetween host and guest populations,the doubleedged function of the Church (and dual allegiance of the clergy)as an official institutionrepresentingstate interestsabroad, but also as a spiritualanchorage , or simplya meeting place in the dailylives of Russiantravellers,residents or exiles. But none of these is handled in an effectivemanner. That said, this is an extremely informativestudy and no doubt a useful one to consult for those specializingin Church and/or emigrationhistory. School ofHistogy FRANCEs NETHERCOTT University ofStAndrews Shneer, David. Yiddish andtheCreation ofSoviet JewishCulture, i9i8-I930. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge and New York, 2004. ix + 300 pp. Illustrations.Notes. Bibliography.[30.00: $45.00. WHILEJews played a prominentpart in the Russianrevolutionarymovement, they were not well-representedin the Bolshevikfaction, despite the presence of prominent individualslike Trotskii, Kamenev and Zinov'ev. The absence of Jewish cadres was particularlyapparent when efforts were made, postOctober , to 'takethe Revolution to theJewish street'.In order to accomplish thisgoal of spreadingsocialistideals,the CommunistPartyhad to rely onJews co-opted from other parties, especially the Bund. There was a price to pay: these activistsalready had developed a programme for fashioning a modern Jewish identity.Willy-nilly,their ideological preceptswere integratedinto the Partyprogramme. Historianshave not generallybeen kind to these activists,who are usually portrayedas naive (at best) collaborators,or rank political opportunists,who thoughtlesslydismantledtheJewish culturalheritage. David Shneer seeksto rehabilitatethese pioneers and restorethem to their rightfulplace in modernJewish history.He characterizesthem as the 'Soviet Yiddish intelligentsia'and describes them as individuals intent on building a modern, secularJewish culture. In the main they were veterans of the Jewish culturewars fought between Bundistsand Zionists,Yiddishistsand Hebraists that had been fought out in the decades before the Great War. As Shneer demonstrates,their destructiveactivitiesonce in power, directedat both their religious and Hebraist opponents alike, were balanced by positive initiativesto create a new, modernJewish identity. Its attributeswere to be REVIEWS 353 national, secularand based on the Yiddish language. In short, they sought to establishtheJews as an ethnic group, whose culturewas transmittedthrough a national vernacular,while eschewing any notion of theJews as a religious community. This same process was at work in the West, it should be noted, but spontaneously,without active state support. The greatbreakof the SovietYiddishintelligentsiawas to detachJews from Judaism and its millennia-oldreligiousculture.But once religiousculturewas removed, what remained to make theJews 'a nation differentfrom all other nations'?The answerwas found in the Yiddishlanguage,seen as the carrierof a secularJewish culture. To make their case, the Soviet Yiddish intelligentsia had to engage in 'culturalproduction' in Yiddish. This task necessitatedand justifiedtheir role as intermediariesbetween the Soviet regime and theJewish masses.Their accomplishmentwas to secureofficialsupportfor this objective. Historiansof SovietJewry have always acknowledgedthe Yiddish cultural institutionscreatedunder this arrangement:schools,theatres,printinghouses, etc.. They have usually been dismissed as no more than 'national in form, socialist in content' and devoid of any Jewish content. Thus, it was claimed, Sholem Aleichem became part of the educational curriculumonly after the ideological content of his stories was bulked up. His quintessential shtetl, Kasrilevka, filled with Jewish types such as the shnorrer (beggar),the luftmensch who survivedon air, and the good-natureddairymanTevye, whose chief concern was to marry off his many daughters,was transformedinto a battlegroundof class struggle. Shneer disputes this stereotypical picture as incomplete. He would supplementit with the accomplishmentsof the Soviet Yiddishintelligentsia however tragictheirultimatefate 'to create a secularYiddishcultureand a people who identifiedwith thatculture'(p. 2I9). As he demonstrates,therewas never a unitarySoviet state that prescribedthe form this culturewas to take. Rather, there was a vigorous contest between members of the Soviet Yiddish intelligentsiaand disparate representativesof the Soviet state...