George Steiner: polymath, polyglot,
storyteller; Jewish genius,
anti-Zionist, iconoclast,
storyteller; literary prodigy,
literary prodigal, European,
Cosmopolitan, storyteller…
“Anti-Semitic jokes often contain a
grain of truth. Hegel told this one: ‘God arrives,
and in his right hand he is holding
the holy texts of the revelation
and the promise of heaven; in his left hand,
the Berlin newspaper, Die Berliner Gazette.
The Jew chooses the newspaper’. Hegel’s
anti-Semitic joke contains a profound
truth: Jews are passionate about the ductus,
the internal current of history and time.’
In Steiner’s controversial novella,
‘The Portage To San Cristobal Of A.H.’,
A.H. – Adolf Hitler – escaped the bunker
and the Allies and, for thirty years,
hid in the Amazonian jungle
until Nazi hunters captured him.
Events – human and natural – prevent them
from reaching San Cristobal so his captors
put him on trial in the jungle. He argues
that the Jews should be grateful to him for
the Holocaust since it led directly
to the foundation of the State of Israel.
Steiner considered that both the First
and the Second World Wars were, in essence,
European civil wars, and viewed
history through the lens of the Holocaust.
His family moved from Vienna
to Paris as anti-Semitism grew
in the Thirties, and then to New York
before the Germans invaded France.
When he was six years old his father
taught him Ancient Greek so that he would
be able to read ‘The Illiad’
in the original, which he did aged six.
“When I get up in the morning, I
tell myself this story, so I can make it
through the day: God announces that he’s
sick of us. Really. “I’m fed up!” In 10 days,
the flood. The real one. No Noah this time. That
was a mistake. The Holy Father
tells the Catholics, ‘Very well. It’s God’s will.
You will pray. You will forgive each other.
You will gather your families and wait
for the end’. The Protestants say, ‘You will
settle your financial affairs. Your affairs
must be completely settled. You will gather
your families and you will pray’. The rabbi says,
‘Ten days? But that’s more than enough time
to learn how to breathe under water!’
And every day that magnificent story
gives me the strength and happiness to live my life.
And I believe it, deeply: Ten days
is indeed a long time.”
Note: the two quotations – beginning “Anti-Semitic jokes…” and “When I get up…” – are from:
By David Selzer