On Stage, Off Stage: Memories of a Lifetime in the Yiddish Theatre (review)

Book Reviews 127 Ironically, Pinsker's appropriate and very important emphasis on Cahan's great novel, Ibe Rise of David Levinsky, could have led him to rethink his views along similar lines and connect that world to the one Roth presents, for in both a similar emptiness of spirit is evoked and its sources and meanings illuminated. Perhaps that would have taken Pinsker into areas of religious and philosophical thinking that are increasingly central to contemporary literary and critical thought-but these are realms that, by invoking the moderns as touchstones ofa limited kind, Pinsker has kept at arm's length. It is what he embraces, and how, which limit the value of his work-unless that typo about Singer's "adoring pubic" is the subtext of Pinsker's work we should be excavating. Murray Baumgarten The Dickens Project University of California, Santa Cruz On Stage, Off Stage: Memories of a Lifetime in the Yiddish Theatre, by Luba Kadison and Joseph Buloff with Irving Genn. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1992. 161 pp. $29.95. The title On Stage, Off Stage doesn't do justice to the journey this volume has in store for the reader. The sub-title Memories ofa Lifetime in the'Yiddish Theatre captures more accurately the incredible scope and experience of 70 years in the lives of Joseph Buloff and Luba Kadison Buloff. This account is remarkably successful at weaving often disparate source material into a moving account of the journey of two theatre pioneers through a dramatically changing world. Transported back in time, we are reminded of the tremendous tumult that has characterized our world over the course of this century. Prepared by Luba Kadison Buloff, who supplies most of the narrative, the work contains stories, letters, and documentation, as well as photos and facsimiles of theatrical programs and posters. More than a journal, this book is a memorial that brings to life the journey of two courageous theatre artists through a world turned upside down by war and social revolution. Though the richness of the journey achieves its apex in the storytelling of Mr. Buloff, Ms. Kadison ably keeps this epic on track and moving ever forward. The story begins with Ms. Kadison's childhood memories of Kovno, and then Vilna, Lithuania. We see through her eyes how a theatre group somehow emerged in the German-occupied town of Vilna. Gathered around a small stove, the members of what would become known as the 128 SHOFAR Summer 1994 Vol. 12, NO.4 Yilna Troupe huddled with their big meal for the day-a single potatoand discussed their art and mission. Suddenly, our vantage point shifts and we are among the cauldrons in a food kitchen. A smuggler is giving soup to a famous actress of the Yiddish theatre in exchange for a free ticket to a production. The smuggler is Joseph Buloff, and his stories are so incredible that we forget we are involved in a documentary. His escape from antisemitic Polish guards by hanging onto the windowbars of a moving train is all the more heartstopping when we realize it really happened. Mr. Buloffs ability to catapult the reader into the immediacy of the moment is so complete, we need Ms. Kadison's perspective to remind us we're not reading a novel. Her accounts serve as representational photographs that lend clarity and objectivity to the times, whereas his capture the immediacy of moment-to-moment events with a hand-held camera. The two very different narrative styles create a balance that shifts our attention from the drama of life to the turmoil of a changing world. From their very first meeting, they seem as fated as the two lovers in The Dybbuk, the Yilna Troupe's most successful production. Ms. Kadison remembers opening the door to see a dangerous-looking man with a cap over one eye. She screams. And so begins their life together. The sights and sounds of history lived stay with you long after the first read: we hear the voice of the legendary director, Max Reinhart, after a performance of The Dybbuk, proclaiming, "This is not play-acting! It is a religious rite"; we feel the crescendo of...