The Spirit of the Ghetto:Studies of the Jewish Quarter in New York

by Hutchins Hapgood

The Old and the New THE OLD MAN No part of New York has a more intense and varied life than the colony of Russian and Galician Jews who live on the east side and who form the largest Jewish city in the world. The old and the new come here into close contact and throw each other into high relief. The traditions and customs of the orthodox Jew are maintained almost in their purity, and opposed to these are forms and ideas of modern life of the most extreme kind. The Jews are at once tenacious of their character and susceptible to their Gentile environment, when that environment is of a high order of civilization. Accordingly, in enlightened America they undergo rapid transformation tho retaining much that is distinctive; while in Russia, surrounded by an ignorant peasantry, they remain by themselves, do not so commonly learn the Gentile language, and prefer their own forms of culture. There their life centres about religion. Prayer and the study of "the Law" constitute practically the whole life of the religious Jew. When the Jew comes to America he remains, if he is old, essentially the same as he was in Russia. His deeply rooted habits and the "worry of daily bread" make him but little sensitive to the conditions of his new home. His imagination lives in the old country and he gets his consolation in the old religion. He picks up only about a hundred English words and phrases, which he pronounces in his own way. Some of his most common acquisitions are "vinda" (window), "zieling" (ceiling), "never mind," "alle right," "that'll do," "politzman" (policeman); "ein schön kind, ein reg'lar pitze!" (a pretty child, a regular picture). Of this modest vocabulary he is very proud, for it takes him out of the category of the "greenhorn," a term of contempt to which the satirical Jew is very sensitive. The man who has been only three weeks in this country hates few things so much as to be called a "greenhorn." Under this fear he learns the small vocabulary to which in many years he adds very little. His dress receives rather greater modification than his language. In the old country he never appeared in a short coat; that would be enough to stamp him as a "freethinker." But when he comes to New York and his coat is worn out he is unable to find any garment long enough. The best he can do is to buy a "cut-away" or a "Prince Albert," which he often calls a "Prince Isaac." As soon as he imbibes the fear of being called a "greenhorn" he assumes the "Prince Isaac" with less regret. Many of the old women, without diminution of piety, discard their wigs, which are strictly required by the orthodox in Russia, and go even to the synagogue with nothing on their heads but their natural locks. The old Jew on arriving in New York usually becomes a sweat-shop tailor or push-cart peddler. There are few more pathetic sights than an old man with a long beard, a little black cap on his head and a venerable face—a man who had been perhaps a Hebraic or Talmudic scholar in the old country, carrying or pressing piles of coats in the melancholy sweat-shop; or standing for sixteen hours a day by his push-cart in one of the dozen crowded streets of the Ghetto, where the great markets are, selling among many other things apples, garden stuff, fish and second-hand shirts

Genres: History

312 pages, Kindle Edition

First published January 1, 1902

About the author

Hutchins Harry Hapgood was an American journalist, author and anarchist.

(wikipedia)

Reviews

[Benjamin Fasching-Gray · Rating 5 out of 5]

Picture Hapgood in the Lower East Side of 1902, really digging it. He's like, "These Russian Jews are fascinating! They are so serious, even the 'nudniks!'" Compare him with hipsters today who might get into some immigrant group ... people like me, actually, probably ... and I think Hapgood will come out looking pretty good. He really knows a lot about turn of the century Jewish New York and he doesn't make caricatures, or make it all out to be sunshine and roses, or make it all out to be misery without end. One of the things he admires about some of the Yiddish writers he profiles is their insistence on capital-T Truth and you can feel that same motivation in his own writing.

I always have a hard time reading stuff like this. I call it the kryptonite thing. You know, you get near a piece of the home planet and all your superpowers fade away? But somehow I didn't have that with this book. At first I was thinking, OK, OK, I know this basic stuff about Jewish immigrants in the US ... the stuff he needs to explain to a goyish audience in the beginning. But when he gets to "the Spirit" part, all the Yiddish theaters and poets and luftmenschen and the socialists and the anarchists and the cafes, it felt good to see "my people" through the eyes of Hapgood.

Most of all though, it is just fun. The edition I read had notes from the 1960s written by someone who lived as a child in the neighborhood Hapgood is describing and it was good to have an 'authentic informant' confirming Hapgood's version and it also added some extra flavor.

Yeah, there are tons of books about that part of NYC at that time, and I will probably continue to recommend Jews Without Money over this one, but if one Jewish LES book isn't enough, you could do a lot worse than this impressionistic journalistic piece.

[M. Newman · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book came highly recommended as a window into the lives of the Jewish immigrants of the Lower East Side and I was quite eager to read it. Unfortunately, I was a little disappointed. Although Mr. Hapgood was accurate in the portrayal of his subjects, his portraits appeared dry and obviously written by a non-Jewish outsider. His "Spirit of the Ghetto" was actually pretty spiritless and came off as an anthropological study. For a more interesting and realistic picture of these dynamic people, I suggest Irving Howe's "World of Our Fathers" or the fiction of Abraham Cahan. The beautiful drawings of Jacob Epstein, however, compensate for the shortcomings of Hapgood's stilted prose and make this book a worthwhile read.