Still Lives
Newly discovered photographs shed light on daily existence in the Pale of Settlement
From the An-sky photo archive.
CREDIT: Courtesy of Petersburg Judaica, European University at St. Petersburg
In 1914, a Russian Jew writing under the name S. An-sky wrote a play called The Dybbuk. It concerns a young bride-to-be possessed by the spirit of her former lover, and it would go on to become one of the most popular plays in the Jewish- and Yiddish-theater repertoire. But An-sky’s pre-Dybbuk work might be his most valuable contribution to Jewish culture: from 1912 to 1914, the playwright led ethnographic expeditions throughout Russia’s Pale of Settlement, collecting Jewish folk tales, rituals, music, and other artifacts of daily and religious life. An-sky’s research has been an invaluable resource to students of Jewish history and culture. Now, a new body of material from those expeditions has come to light: approximately 350 photographs, comprising perhaps the most comprehensive visual record available of these small towns and the people who inhabited them. The photos are remarkable not only for the wealth of detail they offer about a way of life in transition, but also for the immediacy of the subjects themselves.
A collection of nearly 200 of these newly discovered photos is now available in a volume titled Photographing the Jewish Nation: Pictures from S. An-sky’s Ethnographic Expeditions. Vox Tablet spoke to two of the book’s editors, Eugene Avrutin and Harriet Murav, both professors at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, about the importance of this collection for anyone interested in shtetl life in the Russian Empire. A gallery of photos from the book appears below.
Photographs from S. An-sky's ethnographic expeditions, 1912-1914
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A family.
Photographs are reproduced from the An-sky photo-archive, courtesy of Petersburg Judaica, European University at St. Petersburg.
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At a cigarette factory, Starokonstantinov.
Photographs are reproduced from the An-sky photo-archive, courtesy of Petersburg Judaica, European University at St. Petersburg.
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From left to right: Solomon Iudovin, Iulii Engel’, S. An-sky.
Photographs are reproduced from the An-sky photo-archive, courtesy of Petersburg Judaica, European University at St. Petersburg.
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Torah ark in a synagogue, Starokonstantinov, 1912 (An-sky, bottom left, assists the photographer by holding the chandelier with his cane).
Photographs are reproduced from the An-sky photo-archive, courtesy of Petersburg Judaica, European University at St. Petersburg.
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I give up. I find no way around the fact that these photos are just completely depressing. They led sad, hard lives and then were hunted and murdered. Statistically speaking, maybe five of these people got out before the Shoah obliterated their entire world?
Hand me the Prozac, please…
If you live in Europe, as I do, you’re only happy to know that at least some of the material from that period survived. I think it’s fascinating.
The young bride-to-be in The Dybbuk is not possessed by her “former lover.” This is the Jewish shtetl, after all. The spirit which possesses her is the young man who was betrothed to her at birth by the two fathers. An-sky was expressing his opinion that such shiduchs from birth are not only unfair to the people involved, but may also be laden with unknown dangers.
If you look at the Jewish life and culture that existed in the Pale and in the Cities of Western and Central Europe you’ll understand what small consolation are the contemporary Jewish communities in America and Israel,and the vastness of what was actually and potentially lost not only to Nazism but also to some extent to communism.
The photograph of the Talmud Torah students could well have been my grandparents. Indeed, they faced poverty, pogroms, and disease, but they also knew how to survive.
They cooked their own food, sewed their own clothes, cut their own logs, and were highly literate. Very self-reliant, considering their overall situation.
“lost not only to Nazism but also to some extent to communism”, “small consolation are the contemporary Jewish communities in America and Israel”? Shouldn’t we be as equally concerned and trying everything we can to prevent the remainder of the Jewish communities around the world from being obliterated through intermarriage.
in doing research a lot of my family in the pale were cigarette rollers. they carried that to london. and then on to chicago. i had no idea this was such a pervasive occupation, even in russia…
beautiful stuff.
The music recorded on these expeditions is also extant and available on CDs (digitally transcribed from the original wax cylinders!) from the University of Kiev. Much of it is in the Fehrer Music Archives at Beit Hatefutsot in Tel Aviv, where I listened to songs, both popular and liturgical, from Mogilev, Belarus. This was when some of our family was still there and they likely heard those same songs sung by the same people. There is a wealth of resources out there for those trying to learn about their families. From photographs to music, we never know what we’ll find once we start searching. Each piece of the puzzle is an adventure and may lead to something else entirely.