Re: The Greek-Jewish Theater in Judeo-Spanish

[Gwynne Sigel <gittele...>]

At 04:15 PM 3/26/03 +0100, you wrote:
>Hi Eva,
I would be interested in seeing the whole article if you do get around to 
downloading it.

Thanks,

Gwynne gittele (at) comcast(dot)net

>Hi everyone,
>
>While looking for some other info, I came across an interesting article 
>about the Greek-Jewish theater in Judeo-Spanish.
>
>The title is "The Greek-Jewish Theater in Judeo-Spanish, ca. 1880-1940", 
>it's written by Yitzchak Kerem and it was published in: Journal of Modern 
>Greek Studies 14.1 (1996) 31-45
>
>The article is too long to send to the list, but if I manage to 
>copy/download it, I could sent it to anyone interested. The following is 
>an excerpt that ties in nicely with the Jewish musical/Purim thread:
>
>Theatrical activity in Thessaloniki became intense in the 1920s and the 
>1930s. 3 In 1932, the musical Ester was performed on Purim in 
>Judeo-Spanish at the Winter Theater on Megalou Alexandrou by members of 
>the religious Zionist movement BPnai Mizrahi. The play was written by the 
>Betar activist Shlomo Reuvain. Isaac Sion composed the music, and an 
>orchestra accompanied the production. Reuvain based his adaptation on the 
>dialogue between Esther and King Ahasuerus in the play Esther by Jean 
>Racine, the seventeenth-century French playwright, in which Racine has 
>Esther reveal her Jewish identity to the king (Alexander and Weich-Shahak 
>1993:46). The folklorist Tamar Alexander notes that the Esther story is a 
>classical Jewish folk tale in which there is a confrontation between a 
>good Jew, representing the Jewish community, and a wicked Gentile. The 
>king sides with the Jews. Most of these tales end with the words, "The 
>Jews had light and happiness," evoking another Jewish archetype, "the 
>miraculous rescue of the persecuted Jewish community" (Alexander and 
>Weich-Shahak 1993:43).
>
>All the best, Eva

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