Irene Sobel - September 8, 1998
Jewish Culture
I'm just wondering--the other major political betrayal was the Czech crisis when the Germans took the Sudetenland and then took Czechoslovakia...
I was...
...was there any talk about that? Because that came later.
No. I kind of uh, I kind of uh, was not aware of anything of that.
But the Spanish Civil War.
The Spanish Civil War had a great impact. And I--as I said, remember during--my mother would read to me uh, all kinds of little children's story. But at the same time they were deeply cultural Jews, not religious but cultural Jews. They read Jewish books, Jewish newspapers. My mother would take me, I remember, I probably wasn't more than three or four years old and I remember an exhibit of Sholom Aleichem's book, not book but illustration of Sholom Aleichem's book. And I remember uh, this huge picture, it was called "Z?ota mit a Patelnia." Z?ota is a name of a woman, patelnia is a frying pan. And I remember this woman holding this big frying pan and a little man at her feet. And I remember those little houses and a, a visual display of characters, a book of Sholom Aleichem. And my mother took us. And there were other experiences that were cultural Jewish. And they were deeply, they were deeply involved in Jewish life also.
© Board of Regents University of Michigan-Dearborn