CC Spin #33: Motl the Cantor's Son

By -

 Motl, the Cantor's Son, by Sholem Aleichem

 I'm late delivering my Spin title, even though I finished it a couple of weeks ago!  I enjoyed this so much.  Various people told me that it was a lot lighter than Tevye the Dairyman, which I read a few years ago, and it definitely was.

Motl is a little boy, 8 and 9 years old, telling his story of getting to America -- in installments, because it was published as a serial in a newspaper.  We start in a shtetl in the Russian empire; I'm pretty sure it would be Ukraine now.  Motl's family is poor but cultivated, because his father is Peysi the cantor and a very well-respected man.  After his death, the family is left penniless and Motl's older brother resolves to take everyone to America, 'everyone' being their mother, Elyahu the brother, his wife, his best friend (a comedic bookworm given to declaiming about Columbus), and little Motl.  It's about 1910, the pogroms are getting worse, and America promises a better life.

Slowly they make their way across Europe.  They're robbed by fixers and helped by Jewish organizations, they make friends and meet up with other emigrants from home, and eventually they take a ship to New York, where they're put through the examinations (their mother's weepiness is a constant concern -- what if she's turned away for her eyes?) and expelled upon the streets of the city.  They first live with Elyahu's in-laws while they look for work; by this time half their old neighbors are also in New York.

Motl describes everything that happens with childish zest and charm.  Because he is a child, and doesn't understand some things, Aleichem can hint at dark realities but also hold them at a remove, keeping the story comedic and fun.  Motl is having an adventure, and nothing is really too terrible to bear.  Surely everything will work out.

Sadly, Sholem Aleichem died before completing Motl's story.  In fact, there is relatively little action in New York; it's cut short far too soon.  It's an absolutely delightful story, full of humor and character.  I was lucky to get it for this Spin!

 

Comments

  1. LoryApril 30, 2023 at 11:45 PM

    This does sound delightful! Too bad it was cut short.

    ReplyDelete
  2. reeseMay 1, 2023 at 5:41 AM

    Hooray, I'm an orphan! (Though your translation looks different than mine.) It's both funny and sad, and is exactly what you say of Motl--he doesn't understand some things, but is full of zest anyway. Glad you enjoyed it!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. JeanMay 2, 2023 at 11:33 AM

      That's pretty similar to what mine said! Yes, I'm really glad I read this one.

      Delete
  3. Lisa @ Bookshelf FantasiesMay 1, 2023 at 7:44 AM

    Sounds wonderful! I think I need to add this to my list!

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

I'd love to know what you think, so please comment!

Popular posts from this blog

The Four Ages of Poetry

By -
Image
  "The Four Ages of Poetry," by Thomas Love Peacock I am becoming fond of Thomas Love Peacock.  Besides his unbeatable name, he was a lot of fun.  Peacock was a minor literary figure of the early 19th century; he tried his hand at poetry but mainly succeeded in satire.  I read his short novel Nightmare Abbey last year, but at the time I didn't know that the young hero of the story, Scythrop, was modeled on Peacock's good friend Percy Shelley.  He and Shelley were quite close and Peacock was the executor of Shelley's will. Thomas Love Peacock Percy Bysshe Shelley "The Four Ages of Poetry," a tongue-in-cheek essay on the history and development of poetry, was published in 1820 in a new magazine called Literary Miscellany , which promptly died.  It would probably have been completely obscure and unknown--it nearly is anyway--but for Shelley.  Peacock sent a copy to his friend, who I guess didn't really have much of a sense of...
Read more

A few short stories in Urdu

By -
Image
 Back in August, I got hold of a book of Urdu short stories translated into English.  It's a large book, so I wanted to read just the women authors for WIT, and that would still be a good amount.  August got away from me, and I only read one or two stories back then, but I've continued reading them since.  I've now finished all the short stories in the book that were written by women (luckily for me, there are short biographies in an appendix, since I could only tell from the name about half the time).  I'll just highlight a couple: "The Wagon," by Khalida Asghar, is a hallucinatory, apocalyptic story.  The narrator meets three strange men who are watching the evening sky and point out that it has become red.  No one had noticed until they said so, but the sky is now strangely red.  Then a smell arrives, so offensive and sickening that it causes real pain -- but only once it's pointed out.  And finally, a mysterious wagon, which may be the s...
Read more

Faerie Queen Readalong I: Redcrosse, the Knight of Holiness

By -
Image
I did it, I read all of Book I!  My minimum requirement was two cantos a day, but I managed three a couple of times.  I'm hoping to read ahead, because I'll be gone for two weeks in the middle of this event and I'd like to be able to prep a post ahead of time...but the schedule is already pretty demanding.  The reading is not terribly difficult, but it is slow.  I keep thinking that I've read a large chunk, only to look back and realize that in fact I have read six verses.  So here we go with analysis... Each book in the Faerie Queene features a knight, and a story, about a particular virtue.  The Redcrosse Knight, to be known as St. George after he accomplishes his feats, is all about Holinesse .  This does not mean that Redcrosse already exemplifies holiness; he doesn't.  Holiness is what he's working towards and struggling with.  His foes symbolize various forms of unholiness, and he falls into their clutches at least as often as he ...
Read more