Ron Jacobs Professor

October 12, 2017 | Autor: James Darmady | Categoria: Music
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Ron  Jacobs     Professor  Slobin       MUSC  297     3  November  2014  

Fiddler  Response   Like  a  lot  of  Jews  of  my  generation,  I  saw  the  film  and  play  “Fiddler  on  the  

Roof”  before  I  ever  heard  of  Sholem  Aleichem.  As  my  earlier  encounter  with   “Fiddler”  proved,  it  is  almost  impossible  today  to  experience  Sholem  Aleichem   unmediated.  He  comes  to  us  through  the  lenses  of  translation  and  adaptation,  each   reworking  of  his  material  reflecting  the  moment  of  its  own  creation.  To  put  it   simply,  it  was  hard  to  get  “Fiddler”  out  of  my  head  while  first  reading  Tevye  the   Dairyman.  “Fiddler  on  the  Roof”—its  creation,  its  narrative,  its  themes—is  about   identity  and  assimilation,  religion  and  comedy,  history  and  family,  all  in  contention   like  a  fiddler  trying  to  play  while  balancing  on  a  roof.  After  reading  the  original   Aleichem  stories,  I  have  concluded  that  identity  and  image  were  probably  the  most   trivial  subjects  for  the  adaptations.  It  could  not  have  been  perfect  but  I  thought  that   Tevye’s  witty  personality  transcended  well  in  the  film  and  was  not  completely   watered  down.    He  was  wonderfully  human  and  humorous  just  like  in  the  stories.   Another  factor  that  was  accurate  was  that  life  was  a  family  affair  just  like  in  the   stories.  Loyalty  to  the  family,  concern  about  how  the  family  is  functioning  in  the   world,  and  securing  the  future  of  family  members  are  all  a  priority  for  Tevye  shown   in  both  mediums.  In  both,  he  also  obsessively  uses  religious  proverbs  to  express  his   morals  and  beliefs.    

What  struck  me  the  most  about  Tevye  was  that  it  seems  to  be  written  in  a   realist  tradition.  However,  Aleichem  pretty  much  throws  out  the  whole  descriptive   aspect  of  the  realist  genre.  For  example,  instead  of  being  described  from  head  to  toe,   here  characters  are  introduced  with  just  the  barest  hint  of  what  they  might  look  like   such  as  Hodl  being  described  by  Tevye  as  simply  "beautiful."  There's  no  description   there.  Essentially,  I  felt  like  not  having  lots  of  description  was  actually  way  more   realistic  with  a  first-­‐person  narrator.  After  all,  when  you're  telling  a  story  about   someone,  you  don't  usually  pause  the  narrative  to  go  into  a  detailed  description  of   other  characters  in  the  world.  Tevye’s  voice,  with  its  jokes,  arguments,  and  attempts   to  deal  with  a  crumbling  world  are  exactly  what  made  it  so  real.  In  the  Tevye  stories,   Sholem  Aleichem’s  character  is  aware  that  he  is  being  used  for  material,  and  he  is   sensitive  about  his  portrayal.  A  few  times  he  asks  the  author  not  to  write  about  him,   and  if  he  does  write  something,  to  leave  out  his  name.  Today,  in  contrast,  it’s  Sholem   Aleichem  who  is  on  the  receiving  end  of  the  fame  reflected  by  his  character,  and   more  because  of  Tevye’s  appearance  on  platforms  like  Broadway  and  in  film  than   because  of  his  role  in  Yiddish  fiction.  Over  the  course  of  the  stories,  Tevye  gains  a   fortune,  loses  it  and  suffers  through  his  daughters’  escalating  series  of   nontraditional  marriages.  In  the  end,  he  is  exiled  by  czarist  edict  from  his  home,   where  he  has  lived  his  entire  life.  But  unlike  “Fiddler  on  the  Roof,”  which  is  set   within  a  relatively  short  time  frame,  Tevye  grows  older  in  the  stories  and  we  also   never  get  to  see  in  the  film  what  becomes  of  the  younger  two  daughters,  Shprintze   and  Beilke,  other  than  Yente  pairing  them  with  two  young  boys  before  the  family   must  leave  Russia.  I  feel  like  leaving  the  Shprintze  and  Beilke  stories  out  of  the  film  

was  a  good  idea  because  the  unfortunate  drowning  sequence  would  not  have  fared   well  with  the  direction  the  film  was  trying  to  go  in  and  would  have  detracted  from   the  powerful  morals  that  the  audience  already  learns  through  the  three  older   daughters.    Something  that  was  highlighted  well  in  the  film  was  the  shtetl.  The  shtetl   is  unquestionably  the  center  of  Aleichem’s  stories,  and  therefore  the  characters   seemed  natural  and  authentic  for  a  Yiddish  audience  at  the  time.  The  shtetl’s   dimensions  are  well  defined  in  the  film.  The  majestic  wooden  house  synagogue  in   the  film  reminded  me  of  the  pictures  we  saw  in  class  of  the  pre-­‐World  War  II   structure.       The  adaption  to  film  was  also  able  to  stress  the  topic  of  assimilation  from   many  angles.  These  stories  were  about  characters  who  were  Jewish,  rather  than   Jewish  characters.  Their  faith  was  a  central  part  of  their  story  without   overwhelming  it.  I  felt  like  the  overall  production  had  some  success  in  this   endeavor.  Instead  of  isolating  it  to  a  Jewish  audience,  I  felt  like  anyone  critiquing  the   plot  could  very  well  draw  comparisons  to  any  secular  heroes  of  literature.  Instead  of   a  people  battered  by  the  cultures  they  sought  to  participate  in,  these  new   generations  were  dynamic  and  strong.  Tevye  is  not  just  a  poor  man  oblivious  to   modernity;  he  wonders  why  he  is  poor,  and  he  is  a  religious  man  who  questions  his   faith.  He  keeps  a  Talmudic  tradition  alive.  I  felt  like  his  character  could  easily  be   such  a  success  to  an  unconditioned  audience  type  because  he  was  the  type  of  Jewish   patriarch  men  and  women  wanted  to  see.  In  the  film,  which  carries  an  epic  tone,  the   character  of  Tevye  is  jovial,  even  kind.  But  in  the  stories  themselves,  it  seems  like  he   has  a  much  more  misanthropic  side  to  him.  In  one  tale,  Tevye  grumbles  to  himself  

that  he  isn’t  worried  about  God.  He  will  continue  to  confront  a  higher  authority,  no   matter  what,  but  “what  bother[s]  me  is  people.”Aleichem’s  Tevye  carries  a  much   darker  humor.  It’s  easy  to  see  why  a  group  of  screenwriters  would  cut  out  this   problematic  piece  of  the  character,  no  matter  how  truthful  or  authentic.  The   “Fiddler”  Tevye  was  the  epitome  of  the  shtetl’s  traditions.  He  was  clearly  the   village’s  representative  as  with  the  example  of  the  close  relationship  between  him   and  the  Tsarist  officer.  The  villagers  always  seem  to  consult  him  with  any  disputes   that  did  not  fall  into  religious  matters.     For  any  kind  of  production  whether  it  be  the  Broadway  play  or  the  film   adaptation,  it  is  important  to  keep  in  mind  that  it  is  built  on  escapist  themes.  Sholem   Aleichem’s  work  was  far  more  confrontational  than  romances  or  adventures.  It’s   remarkable  that  the  adaption  writers  managed  to  combine  the  sentimentality  of  the   genre  of  musical  theater  with  the  starkly  unsentimental  subject  matter:  cultures  that   are  going  extinct,  people  who  are  struggling  to  hold  onto  one  another.  They  did  so   by  removing  the  real  darkness  at  the  heart  of  the  Tevye  stories  and  focusing  instead   on  the  lightness  and  the  triumph  of  the  characters.  The  spirit  of  “Fiddler  on  the   Roof”  is  far  more  socially  authentic  than  what  you  might  assume  from  a  crowd-­‐ pleasing  musical.  This  is  probably  due  to  a  collective  duty  felt  among  those  who   decided  to  interpret  Sholem  Aleichem’s  stories.  They  rightfully  felt  they  must  retain   the  source’s  naturalness  while  honoring  the  inquisitive  nature  of  their  protagonist,   Tevye.  Though,  above  all,  they  must  remain  faithful  to  tradition  and  who  could  think   of  a  better  way  to  engrain  this  value  than  to  make  it  the  subject  matter  of  the  

musical’s  first  song.    “Fiddler”  has  always  been  a  part  of  my  heritage  and  it’s  hard  to   imagine  life  without  it.          

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