The Enemy at His Pleasure: A Journey Through the Jewish Pale of Settlement During World War I

by S. Ansky, Joachim Neugroschel (Translation)

In late 1914, S. Ansky, the influential Jewish-Russian journalist and playwright, received a commission: to organize desperately needed relief for Jews who were caught between the warring armies of Russia, Germany, and the Austrian Empire. Thus began the extraordinary four-year journey meticulously documented here. In daily accounts, Ansky details his struggles to raise funds; to lobby and bribe at the tsar’s court; to procure and transport goods to the towns conquered and reconquered by Cossacks, Germans, Polish mercenaries, and Russian revolutionaries.

Ansky also depicts scenes of devastation -- convoys of refugees, towns looted and burned to the ground, villagers taken hostage and raped. Speaking to maids and ministers, farmers and recruits, doctors and profiteers, he hears and sees it all, as the tsar’s army disintegrates and revolution sweeps across the land. Never before available in English, The Enemy at His Pleasure offers a powerful and poignant view of a world at war, and a vital addition to our record of the past.

Genres: History, Nonfiction, War, Judaism, Jewish, World War I

352 pages, Paperback

First published April 15, 2003

About the author

Shloyme Zanvl Rappoport (1863 – November 8, 1920), known by his pseudonym S. Ansky (or Semyon An-sky), was a Belarusian Jewish author, playwright, researcher of Jewish folklore, polemicist, and cultural and political activist. He is best known for his play The Dybbuk or Between Two Worlds, written in 1914. [Wikipedia.]

Reviews

[Delin Colón · Rating 5 out of 5]

The Enemy at His Pleasure is an amazing eyewitness account of life in the Pale during WW I. The translator, Neugroschel, has done an incredible job bringing us Ansky's voice. And Ansky, an accomplished journalist, among other things, has written this frank and hair-raising account such that each chapter reads like a complete short story,although it is non-fiction. Ansky takes the reader into the Pale, at his side, to witness the events and meet the residents.

This is also an amazing resource for people researching the shtetls of their ancestors. The fates of many towns and villages, and their residents, are graphically described. The reader also has first-hand access to the edicts, attitudes, behavior and even the voices of the Russian military and bureaucracy, from the lowest to the highest ranks.

One can read historical accounts and wonder if events truly occurred that way. However, in this book, there is no wondering. It was all witnessed by a journalist who was willing to risk his life to learn the status of Jews in the Pale during the war, and bring them whatever aid he could garner.

[Rhuff · Rating 5 out of 5]

Jewish ethnologist and ex-revolutionary S. Ansky (Shloyme Rappoport) has left one of the most thorough and heart-wrenching accounts of ordinary men and women caught in the meatgrinder of war. Although his focus was on the Jews of the old Pale, his narrative embraces the sacrifice of all human society on the altars of patriotism, while its high priests chant rituals of victory safe in their temples of privilege. Unfortunately for the Jews of Galicia, *their* travails were only beginning: the civil war slaughters of 1918 continued the agonies depicted here, followed by the final flood of genocide in the decades to come.

It was this prior holocaust, the commitment to total war, that gave rise to the totalitarian movements of the interwar years; but here we see that no esoteric ideologies were really necessary. Conventional hatreds and prejudices, militarism and patriotism - with a good dose of greed - were sufficient, uncorked with official sanction to drench the land in blood. Those who rail at Bolsheviks and Nazis for unleashing later horrors in the East (ie, Timothy Snyder, "Bloodlands") conveniently forget the "mainstream" leaders whose noble warmongering for Democracy, Fatherland, and Order set the stage for the rise of beasts.

Thus it's really unfortunate that Ansky's work is largely confined to "Jewish studies," since the tragedy of this time and place is an evocation of trampled humanity still echoing through the following century. Those now embracing "humanitarian intervention" in the name of the same cliches and platitudes should study this work; to know how innocent folk, who merely wish to live, will forfeit their lives for delusions of "justice through strength." "How can you prove that bloodshed is a sin and not a supreme act of heroism?" rhetorically asks Demidov, the intellectual humanist, on page 89 - especially when it's someone else's. Ansky's ensuing rumination on war and its protagonists was unfortunately buried with him, and is confirmed by my own observations of combat veterans:

". . . Many months later, I found something rather interesting, which reminded me of my conversation with Demidov. I noticed that officers who had fought in battles and had met the enemy face-to-face looked and behaved with a mystical serenity. They spoke softly, slowly, never grew excited. They seemed to have grasped a great truth that made them calm. I wondered if this was the renewal Demidov had talked about. Later, I reached a different conclusion. Perhaps the lust for bloodshed has stayed with man since his animal beginnings. Perhaps blood keeps him calm, while the lack of it makes him nervous, so he tries to appease his passion for it. Perhaps people who have shed blood are so tranquil because they have sated their need. I was shocked by the idea, but the more officers I met who had actually fought, the more I was convinced it had merit."

Indispensable reading for anyone, Jewish or otherwise, concerned with the irreconcilable difference between war and humanity.

[A · Rating 4 out of 5]

S. Ansky was a jewish journalist (among other things) that was tasked during WW1 to organize and distribute aid to Jews in Russian occupied & war-ridden areas of Poland, Galacia, and Bukovina. A recollection and record of his experiences during that time, this book highlights the plight of Jews trying to survive during WW1. Treated badly by the Austrians & even worse by the Russians, Jews had some of the most difficult experiences in the Eastern Front, especially as towns were lost and retaken in battles by both sides. Austrians would come, force civilians into labor (a majority of those chosen being Jews); Russians would come (with Cossacks) and cause progroms against Jews, while killing many of them. Many examples like this show how Jews at the time were between a rock and a hard place (although many did prefer the Austrian army during WW1; despite the ill treatment by Austrians which included deportations and bribes, the Russian army & Cossacks were crueler and fiercer in their anti-semitism, with frequent pogroms, killings, rapes, etc). S. Ansky was in the midst of this, trying to organize aid to those ravaged by the war. He shows cases of selfish and indifferent officials or nobility who lived away from the front lines, and how those who lived normal lives before the war could break down and cry at tiny amounts of generosity. A great account of what WW1 suffering and like, and an extremely important account of the treatment of Jews during the time, which is largely forgotten.

[Lorri · Rating 5 out of 5]

Written as a journalist might write a diary, Ansky’s accountings leave nothing left unsaid, no events colored over with fluff, and we, the readers, are left “watching” the evil through the vivid word images of brutality, destruction, rape, murder, mob mentality, mass-murder, and the affects on the Jewish communities in the shtetls from the events of the nauseating horrors of anti-semitism.

I won’t quote from the book, because one passage alone wouldn’t be sufficient to render the scope of the atrocities and horror. How can I choose one, out of so many? For me it is impossible, and would diminish the content of the book, down to that one blurb. One must read this in order to grasp the intensity of the events.

The Enemy at His Pleasure is a compelling read, and if you are prone to having a weak stomach from graphic word content, then I suggest you read this with that in mind. Do read it, because it will open your eyes to the accountings and sickening events that took place during the turbulent time when Russian, Austrian and German armies overtook the small Jewish shtetls catching and trapping the Jews in the middle. It is a look at history you will not soon forget.

S. Ansky died in 1920 at the age of 57.

[mark · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a fine-grained memoir by S. An-sky (author of the play, "The Dybbuk") of his time as a Russian relief emissary to the Jewish communities in Galicia, an eastern portion of the Austro-Hungarian Empire that was contested territory during WWI between that empire, the Germans, and the Russians. Villages and towns were devastated not only by being on the battle frontlines, but also by expulsions, massacres, and even pogroms, by armies on either side of the war. It's been decades since I've read any detailed history of war - I remember "The Red Badge of Courage" and "All Quiet on the Western Front" making a big impression on me in high school, and now reading An-sky's writing with its descriptions of the horrors of war - well, it is simply hard to take it all in, but equally necessary to do so.

[Ezra]

This book is amazing and I want to recommend it to everyone that doesn't understand how WW2 and the nazi atrocities could have happened, but honestly I can only read a page or two and then I have to freak out and ignore it for a while. it's a history of how WW1-era antisemitism manifested in pogroms and other government (and leftist/intellectual)-sanctioned brutality and genocide of european jewry. I want to know these details, and Ansky is a stunningly powerful writer and Neugroschell an excellent translator, but it's just so depressing! Ack. I think I need to read other Ansky books before I can handle all these horrific details.

[Karen Koppy · Rating 4 out of 5]

The book is written somewhat like a diary in that it is based chronologically and includes Ansky's daily experiences while he set up relief and medical services for the huge Jewish populations living in the Pale of Settlement. A few things stand out for me: He was a very compassionate person focusing on justice for the ethnic and religious Jewish people; he wasn't prejudiced against other ethnic groups but recognized the good and bad people in all groups; he would speak up for the down trodden in all groups; he must have been very disappointed in many people that had the power to help those in need but chose not to. He was a journalist and provided well balanced reports. The book showed how dangerous rumors are during times of chaos, and how important honest reporting is to reduce mistrust.

[Peter Rowe]

Interesting account 0f Ww1 Galicia And PogromS

[J.M. Hushour · Rating 4 out of 5]

Ansky was an ethnographer who had spent some time collecting and collating Jewish folklore, music, and whatnot in the Pale of Settlement prior to World War I. When the war broke out, he became involved in organizing relief to the Jews of the area, and pretty much wrote down everything he saw. What is remarkable is, sadly, not the extent to which (mostly) the Russians treated Jews like shit, burned their shtetls and outright massacred people all under the false pretenses of their disloyalty to the czar, but rather how the horrors Ansky recorded here are part of a process that only ends with the destruction of the Nazi Empire and that anti-semitism was by no means limited to words, and action only on the part of those damn Nazi assholes. This book is a window onto a dead cultural world...while it was dying.

[Peterb]

If you have a choice, try to not be a jewish peasant living in the Pale of Settlement during the early part of the 20th century.

[Joanie · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book is a real eye-opener for those of us who didn't know much about the Pale of Settlement and the treatment of Jewish people on the Eastern front during the Great War. Amazing book.

[Bill · Rating 5 out of 5]

Excellent coverage of an area that most western readers don't see much; the eastern front as it relates to the Jewish population in World War I.