260
PARTISAN REVIEW
J ewish fold after the regular business hours .
WS:
In the South, a town like the one I lived in had a very distinct
Jewish community, a visible one. Small towns in America- South
and North-have had a merchant class ofJews . There was a very
strong Jewish consciousness among Jews in the South . I've always
felt there's some connection between the Jewish consciousness and
the racial problem in the South . There was very little real anti–
Semitism of the virulent sort that you get elsewhere, or have gotten
elsewhere- not so much in America but in Europe . The South
was a fairly placid place for Jews. Partly, it's due to the fact that
the Negro problem siphoned off a lot of ugly energy .
If
you had a
scapegoat, in the form of blacks, you didn't have to hate Jews . My
father was a real Southerner to his fingertips. He was born in
1889, not too long after the Civil War, during a time of extreme
racism, and had however a kind of liberal attitude toward people
in general. He was a humane person. Well advanced, in terms of
his humaneness, for that era. He would always tell me-he didn't
realize he was patronizing- things like, "Now we'll go to this little
gift shop run by Mr. Morgenstern." That was a LevantineJew, a
very good looking man, and very expansive . He had a very nice
gift shop - china, silver, and so on.
GT:
Where was that?
WS:
In this town in Virginia, Newport News, a small city, large in–
dustry, big shipbuilding. My father would talk to Mr. Morgen–
stern, about families and so on. My father would leave, and he
would say-I was about eleven or twelve-"Billy, you must never
forget the Jews are the salt of the earth. They're like our people;
they have a good tradition; they're decent people; they care about
traditions." This was his attitude. It was always sort of self–
conscious, but with lots of respect. And that would extend to prac–
tically all the Jews my father would encounter, and there were
quite a few, because both he and they were involved in community
work. I mean , there was a crossover. My father would say, "Mr.
Cahn is one of the finest men I've ever known. An outstanding
man!"
GT:
This was in the early stage of innocence . In time you, or your
protagonist Stingo, came to know Leslie Lapidus , the phoney sex–
pot, and the perspective changed.
WS:
Yes , indeed. But that's an invention . Leslie is a total invention.
GT:
Yet she reflects a certain concept of the Jewish American
Princess .
