Borat and Babel
All week long I've been watching Sacha Baron Cohen making the rounds of the comedy chat shows in the guise of his Borat character. As everyone knows, the Borat movie is out this week, and Cohen has been promoting the film. What's been impressive is that he's stayed within the Borat character in every appearance. Also impressive is that he's managed to improvise some funny schtick with hosts David Letterman, Conan O'Brian, and John Stewart (I suppose you could say that Larry the Cable Guy also does the chat shows in character, but in this writer's opinion, he ain't too funny). Any number of cultural critics have been writing pieces on the meaning of Borat as a clever commentary on bigotry (the anti-Semitic Borat is portrayed by an observant Orthodox Jew), yadda, yadda, etc. Is Borat a comical caricature of the rabidly anti-Semitic Eastern Europeans of recent yore(the ghost of the stupid, bullying Jew Hater)? Is he, as some have worried/criticized, a manifestation of S.B. Cohen's own Jewish self-hatred? Is Borat a commentary on this historical hall of mirrors?
Anyway, all of this ruminatin' got me thinking about Isaac Babel, the Odessan Jewish intellectual who rode with the Cossacks during the Russian Revolution and lived to write about it--until he was executed by Stalin. In his "Red Army" stories, Babel writes with a combination of fascination and loathing as he rides with the men who killed his own people in numerous pogroms. The very short story, "Crossing into Poland," perfectly captures Babel's mixed feelings. The narrator and his fellow soldiers occupy a Jewish home in Novograd. The narrator describes the wrecked Jewish home with a combination of disgust--"...human filth, fragments of the occult crockery the Jews use only once a year, at Eastertime"(he means the Passover dishes, which were the pride of this impoverished family. Also, interesting that he says"at Eastertime") and shame ("Faint hearted poverty closed in over my couch"). The narrator's conscience is pricked. When he falls asleep he has bad dreams. He is awakened by a young Jewish girl who points out that he is sleeping next to the corpse of her father who was slaughtered by the Poles. She makes him up a new bed and then asks, "I wish to know where in the whole world you could find another father like my father?"
The narrator doesn't answer and the tormented Jewish girl has the final words of the story. She is its true conscience.
Um, so how did I get to that from Borat? I guess what I'm saying is that Borat is Sasha Baron Cohen's madcap comical version of the Jew riding with the Cossacks.
In the meantime, I'm currently listening to Andrew Hill's Grassroots record. An interesting mix of Andrew Hill music, soul and Latin jazz. The CD release features alternate takes with a different lineup, so it's sort of like getting two records for the price of one.
Anyway, all of this ruminatin' got me thinking about Isaac Babel, the Odessan Jewish intellectual who rode with the Cossacks during the Russian Revolution and lived to write about it--until he was executed by Stalin. In his "Red Army" stories, Babel writes with a combination of fascination and loathing as he rides with the men who killed his own people in numerous pogroms. The very short story, "Crossing into Poland," perfectly captures Babel's mixed feelings. The narrator and his fellow soldiers occupy a Jewish home in Novograd. The narrator describes the wrecked Jewish home with a combination of disgust--"...human filth, fragments of the occult crockery the Jews use only once a year, at Eastertime"(he means the Passover dishes, which were the pride of this impoverished family. Also, interesting that he says"at Eastertime") and shame ("Faint hearted poverty closed in over my couch"). The narrator's conscience is pricked. When he falls asleep he has bad dreams. He is awakened by a young Jewish girl who points out that he is sleeping next to the corpse of her father who was slaughtered by the Poles. She makes him up a new bed and then asks, "I wish to know where in the whole world you could find another father like my father?"
The narrator doesn't answer and the tormented Jewish girl has the final words of the story. She is its true conscience.
Um, so how did I get to that from Borat? I guess what I'm saying is that Borat is Sasha Baron Cohen's madcap comical version of the Jew riding with the Cossacks.
In the meantime, I'm currently listening to Andrew Hill's Grassroots record. An interesting mix of Andrew Hill music, soul and Latin jazz. The CD release features alternate takes with a different lineup, so it's sort of like getting two records for the price of one.
posted by ken at 12:14 PM
<< Home