Background
Born Shmuel Yosef Halevi Czaczkes, the other half of the 1966 Laureate duo started out in a religious family in what was then the Austro-Hungarian empire (and now is Ukraine). With a rabbinically trained (but non-clerical) father, and a home-schooled mindset, Shmuel was surrounded by images and lessons of faith and folktales that clearly drove his writing.
His writing career kicked off in what was then Palestine (where he changed his last name to “Agnon” to match his first published story), and his family began in Germany. After a fire forced him to move with his wife and kids back to Jerusalem, another fire (this one a result of anti-Jewish riots) cost him his library. Given these challenges, the anti-semitic attitudes that pervaded the Europe of his youth, and the Holocaust to come, it’s impressive that Agnon held on to his faith and optimism.
Works:
I read a few of the stories in the 1970 collection 21 Stories (though not all 21, so feel free to come at me Agnon scholars). In all of them I was impressed by the breezy folktale style structure that made it feel very much like the kind of thing your grandparents might sit you down and tell you at bed time. “Tale of the Scribe” touched on a scribe of the Torah coping with loss; “The Fable of the Goat” handled a father and son’s separation; “Ferenheim” followed a soldier who returns from war to discover that the world moved on without him; and “The Lady and the Peddler” set the stage for pretty much all the psycho-sexual thrillers of modern airport literature (didn’t see that last one coming did ya?).
“[The scribe who copies the Torah but omits the name of God] may thus be likened to a crafstman making a crown for a king; does he not first make the crown and then set into it the diamonds and other precious stones”
–Tale of the Scribe
“At first he shuddered, when he saw her wring the head of a bird, then he ate and even sucked the bones, in the manner of frivilous people who in the beginning do not intend to commit any offense and then commit every offense in the world with pleasure.”…
“while she spoke, she embraced him with all her might and put her lips on his lips and sucked and said, “I never imagined that the flesh of a Jew is so sweet. Kiss me my raven. Kiss me, my eagle, your kisses are sweeter than all the kisses in the World.”
–Lady and the Peddler
“Happiness is a wonderful thing: even when it is not intended for you, you bask in its light”…
Not only the happy ones stand beyond time, but the unfortunate too. All times are ripe for misfortune
–Ferenheim
Message
Agnon is a master of combining folklore with modernism and the result is a whole heap of parables. As is often the case there’s a brief moral warning in parables and fables of all types and Agnon’s no different. The stories I found all seemed to tie into the simple belief that faith in the face of horror and tragedy nurtures the soul.
Position: #1 Goalkeeper
Agnon’s penchant for the parable made me think of a lonely goalkeeper watching the world pass by and considering what exactly it all means. When the pressure rises and they have to step up, that keeper believes in their skill to see them through, and if not…well, just let it go and bring your best effort to the next outing. He may not be the most dominant or exciting keeper you can imagine, but he has his days, and more importantly, he has the right perspective.
Where would you put a parable loving player? The wing? Midfield? Somewhere where he can surreptitiously punch anti-semite Wladyslaw Reymont?
MacKenzie's Boot Room 