The Manor

We are in Poland, this time in the later decades of the 19th century. The novel begins just after an 1863 uprising by the Polish nobility against what had become ongoing Russian rule has ended in humiliating disaster. With this nationalist movement quashed, Poland instead turns to business, and the

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modern world begins seeping into Poland: mines, factories, railroads begin appearing. For Poland's Jews, the period is one of liberalism. In the town of Jampol, one of the insurrectionists, Count Wladislaw Jampolski, has been banished to Siberia, and a Jew, Calman Jacoby, has managed to win the right to lease the count's large landholding and manor house. He judiciously allows the count's family to continue living in the manor house, in order to avoid offending the local Poles, and he begins making money growing and selling crops on the land and, in particular, selling timber to be used as railroad ties. So begins our tale, with Calman at the center of what becomes a whirlwind of cultural and religious change and the personal crises and moral choices, both good and bad, of an expanding group of characters.

Calman himself is an observant Jew. He expects his children to stay within that community and some do. But the Jewish community as a whole does not stand apart from the modernism taking hold in Poland, and Calman, to his woe, has lived to see a growing divide among Poland's Jews: those who demand adherence to the old ways, and those who look westward with approval at the assimilation of the Jews of France, Germany and elsewhere. To them, the exotic, "Asiatic" dress, the standing apart from Polish society as a whole, is a self-defeating lifestyle of superstition, destined to bring down further antisemitism on all of their heads. To the traditionalists, antisemitism is a constant, sure to come in future waves however they're dressed and however they worship. Faith in God and loyalty to the commandments is the only path. Calman's children, as they grow to adulthood, more or less split down the middle of this divide. One of his daughters goes so far as to run off with the count's son. But the world of the Polish nobility is on no more solid ground than the world of the Hassids. In the meantime, socialism, Zionism, nihilism, anarchism and more are debated and sometimes adopted. The roles of women in this world are changing as well. Although this topic is not made specific, the limitations faced by The Manor's female characters, and the extremely unsatisfactory choices they're forced into, become an undeniable theme of the novel.

I don't want to give the idea that Singer's presentation here is devoid of sympathy and even love for the ways and tribulations of the observant Jews. Indeed, his portrayal is laced strongly with affection and understanding. The storyline is a tapestry, or perhaps labyrinth is a better description, of interrelationships between members of the old world and the new, the Jewish society and the Polish Christians, interwoven amongst and strengthened by family, marriage, business and religion. The old world's concerns are offered with as much detail as those more modern leaning. This is a vivid picture of a complex society at a tipping point, full of memorable characters. And of course Singer was writing, and we are reading, within the context of hindsight. In the end, modernization did not save the Jews of Europe.

Here is a good example of the issues Singer is dealing with. Ezriel, Calman's son-in-law, has mostly left the old ways and is studying at university to become a doctor:

"Ezriel had had great hopes that progress could be achieved through education. Yet knowledge itself turned out to be extremely precarious. The entities which were said to constitute matter seemed to have almost magical properties. Moreover, the various materialistic theories, and Darwinism in particular, had put almost all values in jeopardy: the soul, ethics, the family. Might was right everywhere. Man's ancient beliefs had been bartered for the telegraph. But what could Ezriel do about it? For him the old traditions were already destroyed. He was left with nothing but examinations and dread. He had forsaken God but he was dependent upon all kinds of bureaucrats. He had made a mistake, Ezriel felt. But what exactly had been his error? How could it be rectified? As he lay in the darkness, it occurred to him that the young man who had been found hanging in an attic room in the Old City and whose dissection Ezriel had witnessed must have had much the same thoughts as he was having now."

Here's one more quote I like a lot, one that shows more accurately the range of human emotion and reverence for the natural world that Singer displays through the novel, as Calman, about a third of the way through the story, contemplates his situation:

"Calman sighed. He heard his grandson, Shaindel's Uri-Joseph-Yosele, awake and cry. Burek, the dog, barked. The cows in the stall rubbed their horns against the door. The spring was a warm one, and after two years of drought there were signs that the coming harvest would be fruitful. The winter crops had sprouted early, rain and sunshine had been plentiful: the life of the soil was as unpredictable as the life of man. Scarcity followed plenty. When the earth seemed to have grown barren, the juices of life flowed through her again and she blossomed once more. Who could tell? Perhaps God would still grant Calman some comfort."

When I first began reading The Manor, I wasn't particularly enamored. But the more I read, and the more the branches of Singer's story reached outward, the more absorbed I became, and in the end I can say it's a book I recommend highly.

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