Dinner with Stalin and Other Stories

The Valley Of Hinnom

135 The Valley Of Hinnom Leah, Homer, Esau—these are the main characters of my story. And although the names are fictitious, the personages are quite real. Everything I recount in this story happened before my eyes. In other words, I describe only what I personally observed. I have no need for imaginary scenes I couldn’t have observed. They, undoubtedly, were even more stirring than what I saw. One can imagine the raging passions of my heroes, to whom I’ve deliberately given exaggerated names. It often happens this way with Russian Jews. In everyday life they could be: Borya, Misha, Ira. But in one’s imagination: Sasha, D’Anthès, Natasha. In everyday life: Borya, Sasha, Lida. Or else: Petya, Tolya, Natasha. But in the imagination: Osya, Marina, Dima. There’s really no end to the combinations that arise even from the most common Russian names. My story is not common, but extraordinary. In the spirit of Biblical narratives or ancient Greek tragedies. Therefore name-symbols have been adopted: Leah, Esau, Homer. The story that I’m about to tell started in the 1980s in the milieu of Jewish refuseniks. There were many of us. They say that in Moscow alone there were about fifty thousand refuseniks. And even though we lived in different districts of Moscow, on different streets, we were in effect a large community of Jews who had set their minds on escaping from the Soviets. On escaping anywhere: to Israel, America, Canada, or Australia. We didn’t want to live where Jews 136 | DI N N E R W I T H S TA L I N A N D O T H E R S T OR I E S were disenfranchised. We didn’t want our children to grow up, marry, and have children in a country like that. We believed that Jews had the right to another destiny. With one of the fellow refusenik families we became quite close. His name was Esau, and hers, Leah. They had a four-yearold boy by the name of Sid. Before submitting an application to the OVIR for an exit visa, Esau worked as an engineer at a machinery factory. One of its shops produced periscopes for submarines. Esau was denied the exit visa because of the classified information that he allegedly possessed. This is how he and Leah became refuseniks . And with them, little Sid. I had originally met Leah’s brother, Aram. He actually ran an underground Jewish theater. They invited me to play in the klezmer ensemble that accompanied the performances . Prior to that I had lost my position as second violin in the orchestra of the Moscow Variety Theater. I was getting by with giving music lessons and working night shifts as a parking lot attendant . When I had a few free hours, I would rush to a rehearsal of our underground Jewish theater. I actually got the parking lot gig through Esau, who had many connections. Such was our crazy life at the time: odd jobs, waiting in a reception line at the OVIR, endless get-togethers at one refusenik apartment or another, and discussions, discussions, discussions of how to get out of the Soviet paradise—how to secure an exit visa. Our rehearsals took place at different apartments and had a rather haphazard quality because the troupe never could gather in full. On account of this problem, a system of replacements had been devised. For example, my wife or my son usually came with me. They were ardent admirers of the Jewish underground theater. Sometimes one of them replaced me. My wife played the piano; my son, the guitar. This way, in apartments where we rehearsed there would always be understudies and enthusiasts. Homer became one of the enthusiasts of our theater after someone gave him the telephone number of Aram, Leah’s brother. The Valley Of Hinnom | 137 This is the story of Aram. He was about to graduate from the State Theater Institute as a director. But at the last minute they wouldn’t let him complete the final graduation requirement. Aram wanted to restore a production of Mikhail Lermontov’s The Spaniards. To restore this production—the way it was done at the Moscow State Jewish Theater under the great director and actor Mikhoels. The administration of the State Theater Institute vetoed Aram’s idea. He didn’t want to stage anything else...