In Search of Milk and Honey: The Theater of "Soviet Jewish Statehood" (1934-49)

Act I

Act I "Crude Material" (1934-36) Soon, on the wide streets and roads [of Birobidzhan1 will begin to resound the sonorous and joyful song, about which the Soviet Jewish actor has dreamed for so long.... -Shloime Mikhoels, from his salutatory telegram Moscow-Birobidzhan: Mark Rubinshtein The troupe formed in Moscow arrived in Birobidzhan on May 6, 1934, a day before the official declaration establishing the Jewish Autonomous Region1 The actors' arrival on the eve of this event was highly symbolic. The national theater now had the possibility of becoming visible proof of the fact that from the very beginning the young Soviet Jewish state structure was not an empty declaration. In fact, there were no other such proofs at this time. In 1933 more Jews had left Birobidzhan than had arrived, and the number of Jews living in the future autonomous entity amounted to only 6,000 out of a total population of about 50,0002 So no one was speaking about the "favorable results of the mass colonization" of the region by Jews, which was a condition for the creation of a national entity on the territory of Birobidzhan3 However, against the background of the Nazi rise to power in Germany, the Soviet government 's decision to create a Jewish autonomous area was greeted with rejoicing in the West, especially by the Jewish community, which was evidently its immediate target. In the words of Chaim Slaves, a left-wing activist in Paris at the time, "never before was support for the Soviet Union so greatand not only among the popular masses, but also in broad circles of the middle class and the intelligentsia." Personalities active in Yiddish cultural life 1 See the resolution of the Central Executive Committee of the USSR (of 7 May 1934), "0 preobrazovanii Birobidzhanskogo evreiskogo natsional'nogo raiona Oal'nevostochnogo kraia v Evreiskuiu avtonornnuiu oblast'," Tribuna, no. 5 (1934): 1; Lvavi, Hahityashvut hayehudit bebirobidzhall, 357. 2 Lvavi, Hahityashvut hayehudit bebirobidzhml, 89-90. 3 See paragraph 5 of the resolution of the Central Executive Committee of the USSR (of 28 September 1928), "0 zakreplenii Birobidzhanskogo raiona dlia pereseleniia trudiashchikhsia evreev," in Sh. Dimanshteyn, ed. Yidn in P.S.S.R. (Moscow: Mezhdunarodnaia kniga/Der emes, 1935), 177. 38 IN SEARCH OF MILK AND HONEY were especially enthusiastic, no matter what their political views, because Yiddish, for the first time in history, had been designated as the official language of the new Jewish state structure. "Writers, artists, and actors from Warsaw, Vilno, New York, Paris, London, Buenos Aires, and any other place where Yiddish was spoken, received this wonderful news with bated breath," wrote Sioves4 At the beginning of June 1934 30 Jewish writers living in New York addressed a telegram to the chairman of the USSR Central Executive Committee, Mikhail Kalinin. The message earnestly labeled the decision to create a Jewish autonomous entity "a joyous act of support for the Jewish people all over the world."s In Birobidzhan itself, against a background of settlers' barracks and peasant houses wallowing in the spring mud, the newly arrived actors found a 400-seat theater building. It was located in the center of the settlement on Postyshev Street. Characterized by strict lines, it was devoid of any "nonfunctional " ornaments6 On the eve of the actors' arrival literally the whole labor force of the settlement had been thrown into the urgent work of completing the building's construction, which had begun in the fall of 1932 at the initiative of young Kazakevich and with the financial support of OZET? The white, two-story wooden building in the fashionable "Bauhaus" style followed plans developed by the "Birobidzhanstroi" trust and the Swiss architect Hannes Meyer, who wished to construct an exemplary capital for the first-ever Jewish state formations These plans, however, were never realized anywhere. The actors themselves decorated the unfinished empty theater building in the fashion of the young workers' theaters. Red cloth panels, slogans, and huge portraits of Lenin and Stalin were hung out on the pediment. The unplastered wooden walls of the foyer were brightly decorated using pieces of material of different colors; the walls of the auditorium were decorated with multi-colored slogans; and the entrances were veiled with silk curtains. An exhibit of paintings by the young local artist Boris Rozenblit was placed in 4 H. Slaves, Mamlakhtiut yehudi! bevrit-hamo'atsot, 116-20. See also Ocr emes, "Oi masnfayerung in Nyu-York tsulib der proklamirung fun der yidisher avtonomer gegnt in Ratnfarband," 24 June...