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My Father's People: A Family of Southern Jews
Louis Rubin's people on his father's side were odd, inscrutable, and remarkable. In contrast to his mother's family, who were "normal, good people devoid of mystery," the ways of the Rubins both puzzled and attracted him. In My Father's People, Rubin tells "as best I can about them all -- my father, his three brothers, and his three sisters." It is a searching, sensitive story of Americanization, assimilation, and the displacement -- and survival -- of a religious heritage.
Born between 1888 and 1902 in Charleston, South Carolina, their father an immigrant Russian Jew, the Rubin children suffered dire poverty, humiliation, and separation when their parents became incapacitated. Three of the boys were sent to the Hebrew Orphans' Home in Atlanta for several years. Yet the sons all managed to build long, productive, even notable lives and livelihoods, becoming, variously, a newspaper editor, Broadway playwright and Hollywood screenwriter, businessman, and -- in the case of Rubin's father -- a far-famed long-range weather prognosticator.
Private people, reticent to discuss their painful early years, the Rubins were not easily knowable. Still, the author draws a strikingly candid portrait of each, using memories, stories, keen insight, and broad empathy -- fascinating character studies full of individual propensities and peculiarities that together reveal the wider family resemblance. Although the Rubins were mostly nonreligious as adults, their family's rabbinical tradition and their experience as southern Jews were key to their vocational fervor and the lives they made for themselves. "They were Americans, and they were Jews," Rubin concludes. "These were enough."
Told with Louis Rubin's signature eloquence and wit, My Father's People is a testimony to the courage of immigrant southern Jews and their gifts to their chosen country.
Born between 1888 and 1902 in Charleston, South Carolina, their father an immigrant Russian Jew, the Rubin children suffered dire poverty, humiliation, and separation when their parents became incapacitated. Three of the boys were sent to the Hebrew Orphans' Home in Atlanta for several years. Yet the sons all managed to build long, productive, even notable lives and livelihoods, becoming, variously, a newspaper editor, Broadway playwright and Hollywood screenwriter, businessman, and -- in the case of Rubin's father -- a far-famed long-range weather prognosticator.
Private people, reticent to discuss their painful early years, the Rubins were not easily knowable. Still, the author draws a strikingly candid portrait of each, using memories, stories, keen insight, and broad empathy -- fascinating character studies full of individual propensities and peculiarities that together reveal the wider family resemblance. Although the Rubins were mostly nonreligious as adults, their family's rabbinical tradition and their experience as southern Jews were key to their vocational fervor and the lives they made for themselves. "They were Americans, and they were Jews," Rubin concludes. "These were enough."
Told with Louis Rubin's signature eloquence and wit, My Father's People is a testimony to the courage of immigrant southern Jews and their gifts to their chosen country.
139 pages, Hardcover
First published July 1, 2002
18 people want to read
About the author
Louis D. Rubin Jr.
56 books3 followersLouis Decimus Rubin Jr. was born into a Jewish family in Charleston, South Carolina, on November 19, 1923. He studied for two years at the College of Charleston, served in the Army during World War II (1939–1945), and earned a BA in history at the University of Richmond.
Louis D. Rubin is a writer, editor, publisher, educator, and literary critic, and perhaps the person most responsible for the emergence of southern literature as a field of scholarly inquiry. He served on the faculty of Hollins College (now Hollins University) in Roanoke, Virginia. He coedited Southern Renascence, an important compilation of southern studies; founded the journal Hollins Critic; established the Southern Literary Studies series at the Louisiana State University Press; cofounded the Southern Literary Journal; cofounded Algonquin Books, a literary press that showcases emerging southern writers; and promoted the early work of important southern writers, including Clyde Edgerton, John Barth, and Virginia writers Lee Smith and Annie Dillard.
Louis D. Rubin is a writer, editor, publisher, educator, and literary critic, and perhaps the person most responsible for the emergence of southern literature as a field of scholarly inquiry. He served on the faculty of Hollins College (now Hollins University) in Roanoke, Virginia. He coedited Southern Renascence, an important compilation of southern studies; founded the journal Hollins Critic; established the Southern Literary Studies series at the Louisiana State University Press; cofounded the Southern Literary Journal; cofounded Algonquin Books, a literary press that showcases emerging southern writers; and promoted the early work of important southern writers, including Clyde Edgerton, John Barth, and Virginia writers Lee Smith and Annie Dillard.
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Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews
January 17, 2019
This is not a bad book, but I was disappointed. I started reading this book because I was intrigued by the title. However, the author does not explain or describe "Jewishness" in the South. He does a good and pretty readable job of describing this father and this father's family. However, it is not until the very last chapter that he really mentions anything about how their Jewish identity playing out or impacting their lives - and that is to say that they didn't particularly try to identify as Jewish.
The author's interest in people is engaging and the book moves fairly nicely. And you can easily agree with the author when he wishes he had asked his family members more questions before they died and really pressed to get their stories. There is a lot of "One must assume" and "surely this is how it was" or "he must have felt this way" because the author does a lot of guessing of how things were. For example, his father and uncles spent time in an orphanage for Hebrew children and this is stated as a kind of "hook" to the reader. However, there is no actual description of their time there or evidence of what it was like for them there. The author just guesses at it. He also spends a good bit of time using his uncle's plays to figure out what his uncles thoughts/ideas must have been.
I admire the author for doing this project - and his passion and interest is clear. But I left the book feeling that it was for him (the author), not for me, the reader.
The Chapter about his father is the most bright and interesting though - I had never heard of Rubin days and his father's ingenuity is delightful.
The author's interest in people is engaging and the book moves fairly nicely. And you can easily agree with the author when he wishes he had asked his family members more questions before they died and really pressed to get their stories. There is a lot of "One must assume" and "surely this is how it was" or "he must have felt this way" because the author does a lot of guessing of how things were. For example, his father and uncles spent time in an orphanage for Hebrew children and this is stated as a kind of "hook" to the reader. However, there is no actual description of their time there or evidence of what it was like for them there. The author just guesses at it. He also spends a good bit of time using his uncle's plays to figure out what his uncles thoughts/ideas must have been.
I admire the author for doing this project - and his passion and interest is clear. But I left the book feeling that it was for him (the author), not for me, the reader.
The Chapter about his father is the most bright and interesting though - I had never heard of Rubin days and his father's ingenuity is delightful.
November 22, 2011
The story of the author's father and aunts and uncles was not uninteresting. The telling, however, was somewhat ponderous and distant. The last pages, musings on Judaism, his family's interest and participation in it and the distinction of cultural vs religious Judaism could easily have been done without.
March 7, 2015
It was interesting, not something I would usually read. I basically blew through it because I should have read it by now for class.
Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews