1 Where do I begin?
Published in the Forverts on September 7th, 1946
First of all, I would like to make a brief introduction. When I try to describe what I went through during over 50 years in the American Yiddish theater, as well as things I heard and saw over those years, I feel just as if I were back there now, for the very first time - dressed in “vinegar and honey”1, released alone on a big stage in a huge theater, with the eyes of thousands and thousands of people turned to me; Everyone is waiting, waiting to hear me say something, but I’m standing up there in a panic, completely confused and without any idea where to begin…
Well, really, what do I start with and what do I leave for later? 50 years on stage is no small thing!
50 years of acting!
50 years of singing!
50 years of dancing!
For over half a century, years gone and never to return, I knew the greatest and most famous Yiddish actors, the pioneers, the builders and founders of the Yiddish theater in America; I was close friends with most of them, and I have stories about all of them, though I can’t tell them all.
Where do I begin?
And suddenly so many events and moments that I had long forgotten spring to mind. I suddenly remember things I have not thought of for years. The images of people I was once very close with and who have now passed on float before my eyes. And when you say their names and talk about the roles they created on the Yiddish stage when at their peak, you shake your head and realize that when they were alive, they were not appreciated enough. But if they were alive now, people would know how to appreciate them…
And the more I immerse myself in my memory, the more I realize that everything is gone, gone… Away in the distant past, gradually forgotten more and more.
Even for me, the funny comedian on the Yiddish stage, thinking about this weighs heavily on my heart, and I don’t know where to begin.
It’s a long way back…but still! When you think about the long road you traveled, you think of not only those you met along the way, but also your own journey, and it seems that everything was just yesterday… That’s why I will start with myself, and as I continue, I’ll bring many others into the story. I believe my stories will reflect a piece of history of 50 years of Yiddish theater in America. I am sure that the thousands and thousands of Jews who are interested in Jewish life of the past and present will find this interesting.
So, I will start with myself, as one usually does in a memoir. Right away I want to say, not unlike many other Jews that came to America from Russia and from many other countries, I didn’t keep my name when I came America; My name was not Sam Kasten back home, but Shmuel’ik Konstantinovsky. That’s the name they gave me, and that’s what everyone called me. And no one, God forbid, ever thought about how much time it took to say such a long name…
I don’t know what city I was born in. And don’t think that this is some joke on my part, a prank by a comedian who sometimes pulls them on the stage. All my years I tried to find out what city, or what town, I was born in, but all my efforts were in vain and I couldn’t figure it out. You see, there were two versions to the story: One version says was that I was born in Kyiv, in the current capital of Ukraine, when my mother was in Kyiv visiting very close relative of ours who lived in Solomenka2. More than once I heard my mother and father talk about this. I was very satisfied to have been born in such a big city as Kyiv… To be born out in the world, in a big beautiful city, and not some kind of wasteland shtetl nobody has heard of or knows where it is…
But, as if to spite me, as though it was not beshert3 for me to take pride in this, there was a second version of where I was born - not in the big city of Kyiv, but in the small village of Zatishiye, which is located between the two cities of Belaya Tserkov4 and Vasilkov5, in the Kyiv Governorate.
I’m not sure which version is true. We have this whole issue with us…the family is so confused, it was impossible to figure it out. One thing I am sure of, however, is that I was indeed born.
The best thing about it is that I am alive and that for 50 years, I have been acting and singing and dancing on the Yiddish stage in America. I also know that now I am already, boruch hashem, 77 years old, which means I was born in 1869, when Alexander the 2nd was still sitting on the throne of Russia.
This was exactly eight years after panshina6 was abolished in Russia and we were living in a shtetl. I still remember those Ukrainian farmers well, along with their stories about the times during panshina when the landowners could do what they wanted with the serfs.
In the village of Zatishiye, where we lived for a long time, my tate7, Leyb Sender, had a farm, and that is why they called him Leyb Sender the Possessor8, and my mame9 was called Feige the Possessorka. When he was home, he did business with the landowner, Graf10 Branitsky, who was the owner of the whole village and had a large fortune.
Tate was a constant presence in the landowner’s court. I still remember how every time he went to court, he combed his beautiful beard in a very special way into two points, and when he came back, but he told stories about the nobles’ strange whims that he could not understand. And all the usual stories ended with my father shrugging and saying, “That guy’s nuts!”
And by this he meant, what else is there say - we’re living in his world, not ours…
He was a very frum11 Jew, my tate. He carefully preserved Judaism with all the details and rules, and he shunned transgressions, just as one shuns fire. He also wanted his children to be frum and devout. There were six of us children at home, two sons and four daughters, and tate was afraid that we would become, cholileh12, goyishe because of the village. He ensured that we always, summer and winter, kept a melamed13 in the house for us to study with - not only with the boys, but also with the girls.
He also made sure that on Shabbes14 or a yontif15 we would not be in the village. In the village, he said, a Jew cannot observe Shabbes and yontif. And that’s why we all used to go to a Jewish hostel in the city on Shabbes and yontif kept with such meticulous kashrus16 that even the rebbe himself would eat there.
After praying, he would always get joy from bringing some poor guests from the shul to the hostel, and they would eat there at his expense. And mame enjoyed it greatly; She was very pleased that tate behaved in such a godly manner. And when she was well-rested, she used to say to him, with a loving smile in her eyes, “Leyb Sender, mirtzeshem17, you will live to 120 and you will enter genaydn18 right away…”
Sometimes he replied, “Nu, what else are we living for?”
And at home, my father always behaved like a true frummer19, and he did everything he could so that we, the children in the house, would follow his ways. But living in the village had such an effect on us that it was hard to walk always on the road that our father had led us on. The stillness of the nature around us attracted me like a magnet, and when I could, I quietly slipped away from the melamed and went outside and ran away. I crossed the dusty village roads and went to the wide fields that stretched far away, where heaven and earth meet, and I played with the goyishe children and felt free, just like the birds that fly away.
I snuck out very slyly and quietly so that the melamed wouldn’t notice. I was so quick that even before people looked around for me, I was already so far away that they couldn’t see me. I already had my own roads to run and my own places to play. I wasn’t afraid of getting in trouble, because I was an overprotected child; My parents had always given me a lot, they have loved and pampered me. And I was always sure that they would not punish me. I don’t know why I was praised so much. It could be that it was because I was such a little thing, a little elf, who looked so pitiful that so nobody had the heart to treat me too harshly. But no matter what - I was blessed that I could do what I wanted, and I always avoided punishment…
More than anything else in the village, I loved to watch the young Ukrainian peasants dance. I loved watching them dance to the beat of a harmonica, whose tune that lured everyone to come join in was simply a pleasure to see. More than once in the village I followed them to the Ukrainian chapel, where they played at a goyishe wedding. I could not take my eyes off the dancers, who hopped around so much that the ground shook under their feet. And when I came home afterwards, I would dance just like they did all day long.
One time when tate saw me dancing, he shrugged his shoulders, and taking both tips of his beard in his hand, he said, “Just look, just look at the little Shmuel’ikel of ours dance!… What’s the big deal with you? What are you jumping around so much for?
I was very ashamed then. What got into me, skipping around like that? But as soon as tate I got back up and danced again: 20…
Hop, moyi hrechanyky21,
Hop, moyi mili
Life was good for me. I was happy…
Yiddish idiom meaning “dressed to kill”; “all dolled up”↩︎
A neighborhood right outside of Kyiv with a substantial Jewish population. In 1879 (10 years after Sam was born), it became part of Kyiv proper.↩︎
fate/destiny↩︎
In Ukrainian, this is Bila Tserkva↩︎
serfdom, which Russia abolished 1861↩︎
“tateh” - father↩︎
the farmer; generally, Jewish farmowners were well off↩︎
“mameh” - mother↩︎
Graf is count/earl in Russian↩︎
pious↩︎
God forbid↩︎
Torah teacher/tutor; only someone well-off could afford a full-time melamed ↩︎
Shabbat↩︎
Yom Tov; holiday↩︎
kosher laws↩︎
Yiddish vernacular for the Hebrew אם ירצה השם, ”If it is God’s will”↩︎
Garden of Eden↩︎
someone who is frum↩︎
This is a Ukrainian folk song, not unlikely (a deritative of?) this one↩︎
buckwheat blintz (“blini”)↩︎