Sunday, July 19, 2009

Been following the 'Communism Community' on Amazon.com. Read Deutscher's Book NonJewish Jew and Other Essays per a recommendation there, very poignant and historically interesting. Deutscher came from a family of German bookmakers. They moved to Poland in the 1500s. The word for German in Yiddish is Ashkenazi, but there were so many Ashkenazis that his forebearers took the name Deutscher. His father who had written a book reviewing carefully and critically some Jewish idea had this torn up or burned on his return from travels by his mother for being heretical apparently. He was a bookmaker and wanted his son to learn German rather than Polish as this was an international language for intellectuals. Father used to see to him 'Once you get beyond Oskiewic (Auschwitz auf Deutsch), Polish won't be useful.' They lived 90 miles from Auschwitz. his father never got beyond it, was killed there in the Holocaust.

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