Description
Book SynopsisThis volume provides for the first time a collection of writing that investigates the stories and struggles of survivors in the context of the Jewish resort culture of the Catskills, through new and existing works of fiction and memoir by writers who spent their youths there. It explores how vacationers, resort owners, and workers dealt with a horrific contradiction - the pleasure of their summer haven against the mass extermination of Jews throughout Europe. It also examines the character of Holocaust survivors in the Catskills: in what ways did they people find connection, resolution to conflict, and avenues to come together despite the experiences that set them apart? The book will be useful to those studying Jewish, American, or New York history, the Holocaust and Catskills legacy, United States immigration, American literature, and American culture. The focus on themes of nostalgia, humor, loss, and sexuality will draw general readers as well.
Trade Review"
Summer Haven brings to life the vibrant culture of the Jewish Catskills against the backdrop of the Nazi devastation of Jewish life in Europe. I know of no other book that recreates with such richness the history and character of the Catskills and the defining culture of Yiddishkeit. Peopled by refugees and survivors, the Catskills provided a haven in response to loss and displacement, a New Jerusalem, as expressed in the literary imagination, memoirs, and scholarly responses so lovingly collected in this valuable book.
Summer Haven brilliantly captures a crucial part of the legacy of Jewish life in America." -- Victoria Aarons, O.R. & Eva Mitchell Distinguished Professor of Literature, Trinity University
Summer Haven is a must read for all those interested in Jewish culture in an American context set against the background of the Holocaust. Under the astute editorship of Holli Levitsky and Phil Brown, this volume hones in on the Catskills examining from a variety of literary perspectives how the Holocaust was experienced in this very American setting. Among the book's many achievements is its demonstration that while Jews vacationed in the Catskills, their thoughts—and nightmares—were of their persecuted European coreligionists. -- Alan L. Berger, Raddock Family Eminent Scholar Chair in Holocaust Studies, Florida Atlantic University
“Evoking times of great pleasure interwoven with fear and mourning, this rich collection of fiction, essays, memoirs, and inter-generational reflections shows that the Catskills, a holiday refuge, was still intimately connected to the Holocaust.
Summer Haven sets the sharply rendered details of local history in a vital international context." -- Eric J. Sundquist, Andrew W. Mellon Professor of the Humanities, Johns Hopkins University, author of
Strangers in the Land: Blacks, Jews, Post-Holocaust America"As its sub-title proclaims,
Summer Haven focuses on the Catskills, the Holocaust and the Literary Imagination, how Jews came to America after experiencing the agony and horror of the Holocaust and experienced the unique and almost make-believe-funny and peaceful world of the Catskills. We are there through many pages of fiction, memoirs, essays, personal and general, reflections, and musings. The result is an evocation of a time and place, a way of life that belonged to history and now belongs to all of us fortunate enough to have this special book. HIGHLY RECOMMENDED." -- Dr. Harvey Frommer, Dartmouth College, coauthor of
It Happened in the CatskillsTable of ContentsAcknowledgments
Sources and Permissions
Framing and History
Introduction
Phil Brown and Holli Levitsky
Reuben Wallenrod’s Dusk in the Catskills and its Central Role in Catskills Holocaust History
Holli Levitsky and Phil Brown
Memoirs and Conversations
A Memoir from Before My Birth
Phil Brown
The Holocaust, the Catskills, and the Creative Power of Loss
Holli Levitsky
Catskill Reflections: Testimonial, Literary, and Jewish Values in Singer’s Novel
Sandor Goodhart
Legacy
Michael Berenbaum
Imaginings and Re-imaginings
From Dusk in the Catskills
Reuben Wallenrod
Dusk in the Catskills: My Father, the Holocaust, Memories, and Reflections
Naima (Wallenrod) Prevots
From Enemies, A Love Story
Isaac Bashevis Singer
The Holocaust, Three Women, One Man, and a Rabbi: Posthumous Reading in Isaac Bashevis Singer’s Enemies, A Love Story
Sandor Goodhart
From Summer on a Mountain of Spices
Harvey Jacobs
Reflections on Summer on a Mountain of Spices
Harvey Jacobs
From Woodridge 1946
Martin Boris
“Not to Know the Past is to Diminish the Future”: Reflections on Woodridge 1946
Gloria Boris
From Maus: A Survivor’s Tale, II: And Here My Troubles Began
Art Spiegelman
What We Didn’t Know
Hilene Flanzbaum
From Paradise, New York
Eileen Pollack
Preserving the Catskills: An Exercise in Nostalgia, or Survival?
Eileen Pollack
Bingo by the Bungalow
Thane Rosenbaum
Renewal
Thane Rosenbaum
A Catskills Muse
Phil Brown
Reflections on “A Catskills Muse”
Phil Brown
From Displaced Persons: Growing Up American After the Holocaust
Joseph Berger
Resuming Life After the War: Survivors in the Catskills
Joseph Berger
The Catskills (or What Was, Was, and Is No More) from A Jew Grows in Brooklyn
Jake Ehrenreich
Reflections on A Jew Grows in Brooklyn
Jake Ehrenreich
From Dreaming in the Ninth
Ezra Cappell
Balm of Gilead: Haunted in the Catskills
Ezra Cappell
New Imaginings and Last Days
The Four Seasons Lodge: Survivors in the Bungalow Colony
Andrew Jacobs
Prize-Winning Essays: Fiction
Catskill Dreams and Pumpernickel
Bonnie Shusterman Eizikovitz
Your Dovid
Rita Calderon
Prize-Winning Essay: Non-Fiction
Forgiving God in the Catskills
Michael Kirschenbaum
Index
