Summary Information
Evelyn Torton Beck Oral History Interview
1975
Tape 683A
1 tape recording (63 minutes)
Wisconsin Historical Society (Map)
Tape-recorded interview conducted April 4, 1975, by Lorna Kniaz with Evelyn Torton Beck, a University of Wisconsin-Madison German and comparative literature professor, for the Wisconsin Jewish Archives. Discussion concerns her childhood in Germany, Italy, and New York City, youthful Zionist activities, her frustration at being an educated housewife and her return to academia, and her career interests and activities including work with Yiddish author I. B. Singer.
English
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Content Notes
- Born 1933 in Vienna, Austria
- Father arrested in 1938 and sent to Dauchau and Buchenwald by the Gestapo--released in 1939
- Went to Italy for 1 year
- 1940 to New York
- Parents: father--Galicia, Poland--Bueh-cha; mother--Czech, native of Austria
- Father--made frankfurter casements--own business
- Italy--soup kitchens, lunch--spaghetti with marmalade
- Parents--left parents and sisters in Vienna; mother visited father in hospital--left alone in attic
- Aunt sent money and convinced sons to get visa
- Spoke German at home, learned Italian fluently; until U.S.--forgot and had to relearn in junior high; mother had never learned Yiddish; father spoke some; Evelyn learned Yiddish at Sholom Aliechem Folkshula
- Anti-semitism in Europe--certain stores couldn't go into but because didn't look Jewish could get butter in a different neighborhood; Nazis all over; not allowed to go to school in Austria
- Brooklyn--relatives lived in Bronx; with distant relatives; own apartment in Eastern York--mixed neighborhood--afraid at night in hallway
- Jewish education--
- Talmud Torah--after school--Hebrew and prayers by rote; transferred to Yiddish schools
Sholom Aleichem Folkshula; also Hebrew and prayers--poor student
- Zionist--Shomer Hatzar--communist youth; father general Zionist--joined when 10 years; quit when leader did; no make-up, no drinking or smoking
- Young Judea and others but not as much impression as Shomer
- Shomer--uniforms--loose skirts and handkerchiefs around necks designated group
- Parents--conservative temple--forced to go on High Holidays--children running around--women talking about new hats--neighborhood temple--mixed nationalities
- Neighborhood markets--hated shopping--pushcarts--noise and dirt--poor and immigrant--liked modern stores
- Negro family around corner--friendly
- 6-year-old friend died--impressed by funeral
- Out of class (grouped by ability) only 5 non-Jews; no non-Jews as best friends and did not usually play with--parents did not object to non-Jews until adolescence--parents seemed surprised that non-Jews (and garbage collector's daughter)was in bright class; mother friendly with Italian neighbors and Protestant storekeeper downstairs
- Moved when 16 to near Sheephead Bay--into similar mixed neighborhood with Italian neighbors
- Parents' friends--landsmen from Vienna were primary friends but 2 hour subway ride away; mostly immigrants--surprised at mothers who didn't have accent--really felt split between those families; parents picked immigrants as friends--seemed to have derogatory attitude towards “American”--saw them as cold, went to beauty-parlor, rich and cool, disdainful of immigrants and self-seeking, lack of sensitivity
- Pressure as child to go to Jewish, Hebrew, or temple school; as teenager, pressure to be an “Alrightnick”--go to temple, youth group and dating middle-class Jewish boys--dressing nicely--obedient and traditional; must marry someone older--“what will happen to you?”
- Never any question that Evelyn would go to college at city school and live at home; field did not matter to parents
- Not conscious of limitations of being a woman, Jew, or poor--internalized and did not consider; majored in English and German; Masters in German program at Yale (husband was going also); Masters in teaching; no realistic picture of career but knew liked teaching
- Adolescence--threat of bodily injury if dated non-Jews; went to theater on Yom Kippur--thrown out of house; emotional reasons--implicit betrayal of tradition--background of six million Jews killed in Europe
- Holocaust--tension and worry--no concrete facts; remembers mother weeping over grandmother, crying over ships sinking--aunt in transit
- Intermarriage--parents--derision--totally irrational and emotional; mother's close friends In Vienna married non-Jews as contradiction; “he's very nice, but he's not Jewish”; illegitimate child--would have been hushed up--a “shanda” for the neighbor--biggest reason for not having sex
- Women in non-traditional roles--didn't know any; would have had admiration for any who made it; Mary McCarthy as role-model; mother not allowed to go to school (business) after 16--admiration for professional education; maybe would have sent Evelyn to University of Prague; mother may feel that it was a waste of life to not be educated
- Woman's movement--never worked after Masters; had baby and never entered mind to work with baby; was miserable; life opened between birth of two children--traveling and furthering husband' s career; Madison--up or out-- return to school against husband's judgement--grad student and TA; disapproval from University Houses neighbors; no guilt--clear that there was no other way; no trouble getting into grad programs and TA-ships--unaware of prejudice--but somewhat less money in Comp Lit, German; professor showed surprise that Evelyn planned to continue to work and teach; commuted to job because of not hired here; late hook-up with women's movement
- Women had to learn norms--dress and manner to succeed in graduate school--internalized; pressures are same but there is groundswell against powers that be, e.g., shown by criticisms of male colleagues
- Languages and comp lit have fair number of women but males still dominate--or women who accept male values
- Change--last place will be Wisconsin
- Yiddish literature--eliminated jobs--anti-semitism or too specialized; Wisconsin--students have been taking courses; now being viewed as more viable, e.g. Columbia program--and valid academically; American youth looking for roots and origins
- I. B. Singer--charming and pleasant, listening and willing to take criticism; 2 days a week--comfortable working with him; Rennebohm writer-in-residence; met him--Evelyn writing dissertation on Yiddish influence on theater and Kafka; Walter Rideout invited them on first day he came; Singer knew actor and wrote story on man in dissertation--“A Friend of Kafka”--Yitzak Levy; public lectures, 1967-68
- Translate--much work--more fun if working with author; Singer--would do first draft with Singer--keep changing--as a process; sometimes uses more than one translator
- Interests--Kafka scholar; women's literature and women in literature; Yiddish literature; translation; teaching--some experimentation
- Convergence of Yiddish in world community and position of women in world
Administrative/Restriction Information
Accession Number: M75-559
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