Mikhl (Michael) Yashinsky's Oral History

(Summary written by Michael Yashinsky):

Poster advertising Di gantse velt iz a teater: An Evening of Yiddish Theater, containing photographs of the cast members. The performances took place in April 2009 in the old library (since converted into a theatre) of Leverett House, one of the twelve undergraduate houses at Harvard. This was the first production of the Harvard Yiddish Players. I had the roles of the wandering yeshive bokher Levi-Yitskhok in Hirschbein's Grine felder and the tortured spirit of Khonen in the final scene of Ansky's Der dibek.

(Summery written by Michael Yashinsky):

Photographs of "Unstuffed cabbage," as prepared at Annenberg Hall, the grand freshman dining hall at Harvard College, Cambridge, MA, April 11, 2008. Harvard had a "Recipes from home" program whereby students' parents could submit a recipe to Harvard University Dining Services (HUDS), and favorite ones would be selected to be cooked for the students' meals. My mother submitted her "unstuffed cabbage" (a sort of stewlike approximation of the traditional dish), and it was made one winter's night for 1,600 freshmen. I was not among them. I was under the weather somewhat, and not knowing her dish had been chosen (and who would have thought it would be! galuptshikes at Harvard?!), I did not make it to the dining hall that night. That week, though, at auditions for the Freshman Musical, the musical director told me before I began my song, "Hey Yashinsky. I know that name. I loved your mom's cabbage the other night." Vey iz mir, I had missed them! I wrote to HUDS, expressing to them my equal gratitude and woe, and they told me they would make it again, just for me (and well, 1,600 others). And so they did! And here is the proof. Happy night, April 11, 2008 was—at university in New England, a heymishe reminder of Mameshe and mishpokhe in the Mid-mayriv!

(Summary written by Michael Yashinsky):

Cast of Di gantse velt iz a teater, with director Debra Caplan (top row, second from left) standing in for the missing Julia Winn as my beloved bride-not-to-be in Der dibek. Taken at an additional performance we did for the residents of Hebrew Senior Life in Roslindale, MA, Monday, May 4th, 2009. I am in the center of the top row.

(Summary written by Michael Yashinsky):

Interacting with the residents of Hebrew Senior Life after performing the Yiddish scenes. The performer beside me is Cecelia Raker, who played opposite me as the peasant girl Tsine in Grine felder.

(Summary written by Michael Yashinsky):

Backstage of the Leverett Old Library before a performance of Di gantse velt iz a teater. The players of Grine felder. I am in costume as Levi-Yitschok, Molly Singer as my pupil, the country lad Avrom-Yankev, and Cecelia Raker as Tsine.

(Summary written by Michael Yashinsky)

Photograph of me in the apartments of Sigmund Freud, Vienna, Summer 2009. Reading a book on his life and work. As much as possible, I devoted my Austrian summer, in which I was working as an intern at the Vienna opera house the Theater an der Wien, to exploring the alternately triumphant and tragical history of the Jews of that city. A book that I purchased that summer has since become one of my favorite pieces of Jewish literature—Joseph Roth's epic Radetzkymarsch. Upon returning to school for my junior year, I was tasked with devising a unit for the two-student History and Literature of Modern Europe tutorial in which I was enrolled. Inspired by my summer abroad, I chose as the topic "People in Limbo: Viennese Jews Between the World Wars." We read such texts as Felix Salten's Bambi, Arthur Schnitzler'sTraumnovelle, and Friedrich Torberg's Die Tante Jolesch, oder der Untergang des Abendlandes in Anekdoten, a reminiscence of Jewish Viennese life that a kind (Gentile) coworker at the opera house had recommended to me.

(Summary written by Michael Yashinsky)

Photograph from a performance of poetry and music titled, "Workers of the World, Harmonize!" put on in the Dudley House Dining Hall, May 1, 2010, at 4:30 PM, as part of Harvard's "Arts First" celebration. Performing beside me is fellow Harvard 2011'er Danielle Bendjy, of Long Island. The blurb we penned for the performance read, "In a celebration of International Workers' Day, two subversive troubadours perform a lightsome escapade through the history of the Socialist Movement, with laughing song, merry dance, and costumes. Michael Yashinsky '11, Kavalierbariton, Danielle Bendjy '11, Charaktersopran." The performance included a recitation of Abraham Reisen's "Tsu a sotsyalistin" [To a woman socialist], which I had discovered that fall while enrolled in Professor Ruth Wisse's class on Yiddish poetry.

(Summary written by Michael Yashinsky)

My maternal grandparents, Elizabeth (Elkin) Weiss and Rubin Weiss, both originally of Detroit, MI. At a Chanukah dinner in their home in Huntington Woods, MI, 1980s. In the foreground is a chanukiyah that my mother, Debra (Weiss) Yashinsky, had bought for them, and mogen dovid centerpieces that may have been produced by one of the grandchildren at nursery school.

(Summary written by Michael Yashinsky)

Ammunition Hill, Jerusalem, August 5, 1974. From left to right, my father Gary Yashinsky, his sister Sharon (Yashinsky) Cohen, and my paternal grandparents, Lillian (Dzodin) Yashinsky, originally of Brisk, Poland, and Sam Yashinsky, originally of Detroit, MI. They were in Israel for the wedding of my father's older brother Yerachmiel (originally Ralph) Yashinsky to an Israeli woman, Tzivya. My aunt and uncle still live an Israel and have raised a family of seven children, now producing an ever-expanding brood of grandchildren, keyne hore.

(Summary written by Michael Yashinsky)

My family in front of the Kotel. We were in Jerusalem for the wedding of my uncle Yerakhmiel's eldest child, my cousin Dina (usually "Deenee") Yashinsky, summer 1997.

(Summary written by Michael Yashinsky)

Me in a yarmulke. 4 years old, 1992. At the nursery school of our family's shul at that time, Congregation Adat Shalom in Farmington Hills, MI.

(Summary written by Michael Yashinsky)

Kasha in a yarmulke. Our family dog (1993-2007). She was a Samoyed, a breed that, like the rest of our family, traces its roots back to Russia. Kasha's best trick was, upon being offered a piece of cheese and being warned that it was "Treyf," refusing to eat it until the offerer called out, "Kosher!" at which point she would snap the cheese away and then devour it with astonishing gusto.

(description written by Michael):

Photograph of me performing as Tevye der milkhiker in high school production of The Fiddler on the Roof, junior year (January 2006). High school: Jewish Academy of Metropolitan Detroit. Venue: Aaron DeRoy Theatre in the Jewish Community Center, West Bloomfield, MI. Most rewarding during this experience were the comments after performances from elderly Jews in the audience, voices colored with the accent of the Old Country, who were moved to see a company of young Jews acting out their own stories, the stories of their families. I remember fond embraces with tearful old women in pearls and furs, whose names I knew not, but whose faces and voices were familiar to me as yoykh mit lokshen.