Mark Twain & the Jews
Some things I learned by reading Dan Vogel’s excellent book, “Mark Twain’s Jews” (KTAV Publishing House, Jersey City), 2006:
While Twain on rare occasions (especially before he matured) carried over the anti-Semitic culture he had absorbed in Hannibal, Mo., he was a philo-Semite in an age when anti-Semitism was rife.
He wrote: “The Jews have the best average brain of any people in the world. The Jews are the only race who work only with their brains and never with their hands. [No longer true, if it ever was.] There are no Jew beggars, no Jew tramps, no Jew ditchers, hod-carriers, day-laborers or followers of toilsome, mechanical trade. They are peculiarly and conspicuously the world’s intellectual aristocracy.”
He and Theodor Herzl became friends. They went to German-language plays together and became “fairly close.” Twain even wanted to produce a play that Herzl had written.
Get The Jewish Standard Newsletter by email and never miss our top stories Free Sign Up
Freud skipped an important lecture to hear Mark Twain talk: “I treated myself to listening to our old friend Mark Twain in person, which was a sheer delight.”
Twain sided with Dreyfus-and praised Zola to the skies.
Sholom Aleichem was introduced to Mark Twain as “the Jewish Mark Twain.” Twain replied: “Please tell him that I am an American Sholom Aleichem.” (Twain certainly had not read any Sholom Aleichem, which hadn’t yet been translated into English.)
comments