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Explores the universal longing for home, illuminated through the essays, poetry, and fiction of forty Jewish women writers from around the world.
In this remarkable collection of essays, stories, and poems, Jewish women writers from around the world offer diverse perspectives on the idea of home. The longing for home is as ancient as the exile from Eden, and for the thirty-nine writers showcased in this anthology, the struggle to find and redefine home has been intensified by history, the Holocaust, and the diverse cultural, political, and religious contexts in which they live and write. Together, they explore the many natures and meanings of home: home as a place one is born to and sometimes forced to leave; home as a place one can journey toward or create; home as an abstract composite of memories, emotions, and rituals. Some of these writers contend with exile and anti-Semitism, others examine the mixed blessings of sheltered childhoods, and all confront memories in which the historical and personal are intertwined. Their range of perspectives and their personal approaches to a universal concern make Where We Find Ourselves a compelling read for students, scholars, and all who seek to understand what it means to be home.
"…this thoughtful, humbling and undeniably spirited collection makes a comforting touchstone." — Publishers Weekly
"Where We Find Ourselves is a moving tapestry of Jewish women's search for home in places as diverse as Chile, Romania, Australia, Israel, and the United States. But what is home? We learn from this book that it is many things. It is memory, loss, poetry, language, an illusion, a sand castle to be consumed by time. But it is also the prosaic comforts that make it possible for women to think and dream—it is books, a laptop, a washing machine, and watercolor landscapes on the wall. Sad and hopeful by turns, the stories and essays in this book will illuminate women's yearning to make their home in a place where the heart can speak." — Ruth Behar, author of An Island Called Home: Returning to Jewish Cuba
PREFACE
Miriam Ben-Yoseph and Deborah Nodler Rosen
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
INTRODUCTION
Miriam Ben-Yoseph and Deborah Nodler Rosen
I. DISPLACEMENT AND EXILE
IsraIsland
Nava Semel, translated by Anthony Berris (Israel/USA)
A Home Called Exile
Diana Anhalt (Mexico)
The Kitchen
Miriam Ben-Yoseph (Romania/Israel/USA)
Mirka and I (excerpt from an autobiographical novel,The Edge of the Field)
Helen Degen Cohen/Halina Degenfisz (Poland/Belarus/USA)
Independence Park: A Fiction
Dina Elenbogen (USA/Israel)
Burning in Cuba
Jyl Lynn Felman (USA/Israel/Cuba)
Homeland Security
S. E. Gilman (USA)
A Letter to My Grandmother on Coming Home from Europe
Sara Paretsky (USA)
Marked by Carnival
Dina Rubina, translated by Daniel M. Jaffe (Russia/Israel)
Homesick
Else Lasker-Schüler, translated by Janine Canan (Germany/Israel)
Memories of My Chinese Home
Eve Perkal (Poland/China/USA)
II. PLACE AND MEMORY
To Return to One’s Homeland
Marjorie Agosin, translated by Betty Jean Craige (Chile/USA)
Snow Unites Jerusalem
Dalia Kaveh, translated by Linda Stern Zisquit (Israel)
From Cairo to Chicago
Marcelle Levy (Egypt/USA)
Bella, 1908
Ada Molinoff (USA)
Sisters
Caroline Smadja (Tunisia/France/Israel/USA)
Jewish Oil Brat
Shalom Bayit
Davi Walders (USA)
All but My Life
Gerda Weissmann Klein (Poland/USA)
Kentucky Fried Chicken
Arlene Zide (USA)
America
Viva Hammer (Australia/USA)
East
Rochelle Mass (Canada/Israel)
The Mah-Jongg Set
Deborah Nodler Rosen (USA)
A Jewish Romanian in Oxford
Maria Roth (Romania)
In the Margin
Madeline Tiger (USA)
To the Smell of Sea and Pickle
Dalia Kaveh, translated by Linda Stern Zisquit (Israel)
Isibaya (The Home)
Cha Johnston (South Africa)
III. LANGUAGE AND CREATIVITY
Yiddishland
Ellen Cassedy (USA)
Silence
Dalia Kaveh, translated by Linda Stern Zisquit (Israel)
The Girl in the Balcony
Angelina Muñiz-Huberman (Mexico)
The Music and Language of Home
Sara Schwarzbaum (Argentina/USA)
Here
Judith Ilson Taylor (USA)
Posit
Morning Exercise
Renaissance
Line of Defense
Linda Zisquit (USA/Israel)
IV. FAMILY AND TRADITION
I, May I Find Home
Dorothy Field (USA)
The Dina Letters
Barbara F. Lefcowitz (USA)
My Indian Bene Israel Home
Erusha Newman (India/USA)
In Your Letter
Julie Parson-Nesbitt (USA)
If Only I’d Been Born a Kosher Chicken
Jyl Lynn Felman (USA/Israel/Cuba)
My Mother’s Roots
Helen Degen Cohen/Halina Degenfisz (Poland/Belarus/USA)
My Iranian Sukkah
Farideh Dayanim Goldin (Iran/USA)
Home for Thanksgiving
Rachel Goldin Jinich (USA)
At Home in Shabat
Arlene Hisiger (USA/Israel)
Learning the Language
Tracy Koretsky (USA)
When We Are Born We Are Given a Golden Tent and All Of Life Is the Folding and Setting Up of the Tent
Edith Altman (Germany/USA)
NOTES ON CONTRIBUTORS
INDEX