I got to shake Bel Kaufman's hand!
Mar. 22nd, 2010 10:05 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
ellenkushnerBel Kaufman is the granddaughter of the great Yiddish writer, Sholem Aleichem*. She was speaking at a lovely little reading down at the Cornelia Cafe in the Village this evening.
But she's also the author of Up the Down Staircase, one of the few books I owned as a teenager, so I read it over and over again, and loved it. And I got to tell her so - and to figuratively go back and tell my teenage self, "Guess you you get to meet when you're grown up!" (Since it was an evening devoted to her grandfather & his work, she wasn't expecting anyone to mention hers. You should have seen how her already radiant face brightened when I mentioned her book!)
*Yes, it does mean "Peace be with you," or, more colloquially, "Hi, there!" It was his pen name, kind of like "Mark Twain." His "Tevye the Dairyman" stories are what Fiddler on the Roof was based on. She told wonderful stories of him, including that when she was small he told her to hold his hand tight when they went out, because "the tighter I held onto his hand, the better he wrote!" She is the only living person left who knew him. She is about to be 99! And has a wonderful voice, a wonderful presence . . . . Suddenly living to 99 doesn't look like such a bum deal.
But she's also the author of Up the Down Staircase, one of the few books I owned as a teenager, so I read it over and over again, and loved it. And I got to tell her so - and to figuratively go back and tell my teenage self, "Guess you you get to meet when you're grown up!" (Since it was an evening devoted to her grandfather & his work, she wasn't expecting anyone to mention hers. You should have seen how her already radiant face brightened when I mentioned her book!)
*Yes, it does mean "Peace be with you," or, more colloquially, "Hi, there!" It was his pen name, kind of like "Mark Twain." His "Tevye the Dairyman" stories are what Fiddler on the Roof was based on. She told wonderful stories of him, including that when she was small he told her to hold his hand tight when they went out, because "the tighter I held onto his hand, the better he wrote!" She is the only living person left who knew him. She is about to be 99! And has a wonderful voice, a wonderful presence . . . . Suddenly living to 99 doesn't look like such a bum deal.