TH E HUMANITI ES ANI) CULTU ItE H ER.OES
731
no t physical. It was an immense desire fo r a fresh breeze of Atlanti c air. I
lived in Lo ndon at the time, but I was still stu ck by my tongue to the
mo ther language, held by a last bit o f umbili cal cord . And I had to cut
it. I removed myse lf from the mother to ngue, altho ugh I then reali zed
that I had actually do ne so a lo ng, long time ago, w hen I was still in her
lap.
D oes o ne rea ll y change language, or does language change us by
putting different wo rds into our mo uths w hi ch, even tho ugh they mi ght
sound different fo r a moment , are still o ur own? I'll have to trace my
steps back to prewa r Vi enna, wartime Amsterdam , and wartime Germany,
whe re I lea rn ed all so rts of useful thin gs o n thi s subj ec t. If I seem at
moments to stray into th e thi ckets of detail , please bea r with my
recherche
into a time no t lost o n anyone.
I grew up in Vi en na durin g th e thirti es, no t th e best of times in
whi ch to grow up ; it was if anything the time o f the last moment to ge t
out of Vi enna, Austri a, and Europe, preferabl y as fast as possi ble and as
fa r away as possibl e. Everyone planned a pri va te exodus. Some dreamed
of Shanghai, Melbo urn e, Sa nti ago de C hi le, O ttawa, Mo ntreal, N ew
Yo rk - exoti c names o f citi es we had a hard time findin g in our school
atl as. Unlike o ur closest relatives, we negoti ated with mysteri o us autho r–
ities w ho w o uld grant th e visas to Shanghai and N ew Yo rk , Lo ndo n
and Pari s. W e at home had chosen Palestine, th e land God promi sed to
us and not to the Ara bs. It was a promi se the British Prime Minister Lo rd
Balfo ur had recon firm ed in 19 17 thro ugh th e Balfo ur D eclarati o n ,
whi ch we in o ur Z ioni st youth club had
to
learn by hea rt. It was now
hi gh time to take up the promi se o f bo th the Lo rd and Lo rd Balfo ur.
With Hitl er and Himmle r established in Berlin , it wouldn 't take lo ng
befo re it would be o ur turn to pack up and run . The Ru ssian -Polish war
of the ea rly twenti es, foll owin g th e battl es between th e R. eds and the
Whites, had washed new waves o f immi grants to th e land o f th e J ews
that th e Arabs claim to be th eirs. And in the thirti es, a mere ten yea rs
later, German J ews arrived by th e thousa nds. Th ey too had discove red
there was no alternati ve.
W e beli eved th at Zi o ni sts we re ahead o f o ur time, mo re inven ti ve
and progressive - th e word in Ge rman was
jortsclirittlich
-
than soc ialists
and Communi sts, w ho we re then in vogue. Zi onists we re acc used of be–
ing cha uvinist and reac ti o nary, conce rned o nl y w ith narrow nati o nalist
interes ts, in contrast to the grea t Intern ati o nal Socialist bro therhood of
men w hi ch cla imed to love all races, all religio ns, all colors, and espe–
cially of having th e J ewish genius to raise funds and w rite pamphlets fo r
the great cause. As ma ny still do to this day under different pseudo nyms,
Communi st, soc ialist, and Bundist J ews deeply disliked Z ionists. Zionism
did no t promise to solve all th e problems o f th e wo rld , but, to start
