Mendele: Yiddish literature and language ______________________________________________________ Contents of Vol. 4.394 April 20, 1995 1) Zanvel Aronson (Zellig Bach) 1)---------------------------------------------------- Date: Wed, 19 Apr 1995 15:14:51 -0400 From: zellig@aol.com Subject: The night when Zanvel Aronson was knighted A mayse lekoved peysakh. Oyb s'iz tsu shpet far the di ershte teg peysakh, iz zol es zayn far di tsveyte teg peysakh. Kh'vintsh der gantser Mendele familye, un unzer rosh ha'khavruse, Noyekh Milern, a gut, zis yor mit gezunt un freyd! Zanvel Aronson, the British industrialist and philanthropist, sat at his desk that Saturday morning, going over his voluminous private mail. A corner of one particular letter caught his eye, and he pulled it out from the rest of the mail. Its size and color were special, the paper quality luxurious. The sender's address read: Buckingham Palace, London XXVIII, and it bore the royal seal. Zanvel's heartbeat speeded up several measures, and he suddenly became aware of his own breathing. Disregarding the urging of his curiosity, he opened the letter with much deliberation, savoring to the full the experience of anticipation. He read it slowly, word for word. His eyes welled up with warm tears, and a boundless joy engulfed his entire being. Memories started to flood his mind... He arrived in London in 1922, all alone, a poor boy from Pilvishok, a shtetl in Lithuania... His valuables consisted of a single note of five British pounds, and the pride of his craftsmanship -- his professional tailor scissors, a gift from his father who taught him his trade... The two trustees of the Hebrew Free Loan Society who not only approved his loan application for a sewing machine but advanced him an additional sum of three months rent for his new venture... His first customer, a Mr. Ian McCullough, a teacher of English history in a private school... When Mr. McCullough tried on, at the final fitting, his custom-made three-piece suit and his overcoat, Zanvel stepped back several steps, the better to appreciate, in the right perspective, his art work. His tape measure suspended from his shoulders, he partly closed his eyes, turned his head slightly, first one way, then the other, and judged it excellent. Out of joy Zanvel pressed upon his first customer a woolen muffler (scarf) to go with the overcoat. Mr. McCullough insisted on paying for it, but Zanvel adamantly refused, saying that the accessory enhanced his work and made him very happy. Years later, when Zanvel Aronson went into mass production of ready-to-wear menswear, he followed that first impulse and made it a popular sales slogan "a free muffler with every overcoat," a hallmark of his ever widening and flourishing business. With the outbreak of World War II he received large government orders for uniforms in all branches of the military services, and his factories were repeatedly singled out for special commendations for promptness and efficiency. He stopped short the memory images and called his wife on the intercom: "Malke, please come in." His wife's name was Mildred, but in their courting days he called her "Malke" (Hebrew and Yiddish for Queen), and in affectionate and emotional moments he reverted to addressing her by this special name. When she came into his studio, he handed her the letter. She read: "Her Majesty, Queen Elizabeth II, Requests the Honour of the Presence of Mr. Zanvel Aronson on Commonwealth Day, May 24, at 5:00 P.M. sharp, for his Investiture as a Knight in the Order of the British Empire in Recognition of his Beneficence and Magnanimity of Heart..." They embraced and kissed, and with tears in her voice she said: "If only your and my parents were still alive..." Zanvel Aronson followed the moral precepts of his teachers. As his manufacturing businesses prospered, he made large contributions to local charities and to national organizations with increasing frequency and ever increasing amounts. His heart and purse were open and responsive, and his generosity became known throughout Great Britain and the Commonwealth. The wide-ranging charitable Foundation he established was a genuine expression of his compassion for the sick and needy, the hungry and afflicted. There was also an admixture of his gratitude to England, his host nation, a small return for all the benevolence it proffered him. On the eve of the investiture Zanvel and his wife had dinner at home with a few close friends, among them Zanvel's first customer, Mr. McCullough, with whom he developed a lasting friendship. After dinner Mrs. Aronson brought out the family album, snapshots of children and grandchildren, photographs of parents and grandparents. The pictures taken long ago in Lithuania wee yellowed. One showed Zanvel's family -- his mother and father, his five sisters, and himself, a little boy, about eight or nine years old. The pictures evoked in him memories of holidays at home, especcially of Peysakh, the festive mood, the elaborate meals of the first and second seyders, all family members around the table in their holiday best, and his father at the head of the table wearing a white yarmulke and a solemn white linen _kitl_ (robe), propped up according to tradition with pillows for this special occasion, as befits a king... As the only male child, it was his, Zanvel's, privilege to ask at both seyders the _ fir kashes_ the traditional four questions in the _hago'de_, each one starting with the words "ma nishtano ha'laylo ha'ze" (how is this night different), and his father intoning each time in a joyous voice the answer "this night is different from all other nights..." and retell the glorious story about the exodus of the children of Israel from their slavery in Egypt. "Zanvel," his wife suggested, "why don't you show our guests your regal garb for tomorrows event?" He gladly obliged. He was very proud of his work -- he himself selected the colors and color combinations, every stich, every piece of embroidery done by his own hands, the design copied from an old book on heraldry which his friend McCullough brought him. When he came out from his dressing room, all smiles, his guests were practically speechless in their praise, but Mr. McCullough came up with the right words. "Every inch a Knight," he quoted Shakespeare , and then added: "My dear Zanvel, Chaucer had the true description for you -- 'A very parfit (perfect) gentil Knight' indeed." The following late afternoon he rode in full regalia in an open horse-drawn carriage to his investiture. It was a sunny day, aand some people in the street, having read and heard of the great royal event, smiled and applauded. The high-ceilinged hall was full of people to be initiated in the many different Orders of the British empire, all dressed in respelendent vestments of a veritable rainbow of colors -- crimson red and deep green, mustard brown and bright yellow, Indian pink and azure blue, heliotrope and burgundy... A shaft of soft sunlight came through the windows and added shimmer and lustre to the pageantry. Presently a drum roll was heard and trumpeters dressed in red tunics blared a fanfare. The ceremony started. Each of the assembled moved slowly, presented himself to the Queen, and gave his oath, in Elizabethan English, to always serve proudly the interests of the Commonwealth. Zanvel knew the words of the oath by heart. He had rehearsed them many times, in silence and aloud. But as he approached the moment of his ennoblement a mild shudder came over him, he felt awestruck, and his hear became faint. Suddenly he could not remember a single phrase, the Elizabethan English completely escaped him. For the span of a hearbeat he suddenly remembered the Passover ceremonies at home, of which he spoke just the evening before, and totally unaware, as if unconscious, uttered in place of the oath the beginning words of the four seyder questions -- "ma nishtano ha'laylo ha'ze"... The Queen turned to her Prince Consort and whispered: "This Knight is different from all other Knights..." Zellig Bach _________________ Copyright 1995, reprinted with permission (The _Forward_, 4/14/89). ______________________________________________________ End of Mendele Vol. 4.394 Mendele has 2 rules: 1. Provide a meaningful Subject: line 2. Sign your article (full name please) A Table of Contents is now available via anonymous ftp, along with weekly updates. Anonymous ftp archives available on: ftp.mendele.trincoll.edu in the directory pub/mendele/files Archives available via gopher on: gopher.cic.net Send articles to: mendele@yalevm.ycc.yale.edu Send change-of-status messages to: listserv@yalevm.ycc.yale.edu a. For a temporary stop: set mendele nomail b. To resume delivery: set mendele mail c. To subscribe: sub mendele first_name last_name d. To unsubscribe kholile: unsub mendele Other business: nmiller@mail.trincoll.edu