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The Jewish Image in Argentinian Literature
Luis. H. Rivas

The image of the Jew could not be absent from the literature of a nation whose Jewish population numbers half a million. Jewish personalities, as well as frequent references to the -Jewish world", are significant of the existence of this group within the national life of the country, as well as being a precious element towards understanding the origin and evolution of present ideas and attitudes towards Judaism. It is only to be expected that allusions to Jews, either individually or as a group, are to be found in documents, chronicles or books of a strictly historical nature. However, in this brief study we cannot deal with this side of the quesdon. The same may be said of doctrinal or polemical works where the Jewish question is treated from a political or a religious point of view. All this would demand a more extensive study. Thus, the field of our research is reduced to the novel, short stories, poetry and the theatre.

1. It is currently affirmed that the Argentinian novel began to move towards maturity with the publication in 1890 of La Bolsa by Julian Mane!, (nom de plume of Jose Mini), in which the author, within the framework of stock exchange speculation, describes the period immediately preceding the revolution of 1890; so the action takes place amongst persons avid for profit and little troubled by scruples, some of whom are Jews. In introducing them, the author spares neither epithets nor the most eloquent details, so that they appear as the most depraved of this sad procession of dishonest and immoral men. The Jews are the biggest speculators; they conspire to dominate the world, and, to arrive at this objective, no means however immoral deter them.
Often "Jewish baseness" is contrasted with "the noble distinction of the Aryan race". However, when the story reaches its culminating point and final economic chaos has been brought about, contrary to what the reader might expect, the Jews play no role, nor is their influence in it perceptible. So the conclusion would seem to be that the presentation of the characters springs from the author's own racial prejudice, rather than from the observation of actual facts. The anti-Jewish argument which runs through this novel is modelled on the subject-matter of The Protocols of the Elders of Zion, which was widely distributed in Europe a few years after the publication of La Bolsa.
The line taken by Julian Martel continues in two books by Hugo Wast (Gustavo Martinez
Zuviria), Oro and El Kahal (1935). With curious fantasy, the Jewish community is again presented as a secret organization whose aim is the domination of the world.

2. In 1889 some 936 Jewish immigrants of Russian origin arrived in Argentina and devoted themselves to agriculture. In 1910 Alberto Gerchunoff published his work Les gauchos iudios, where, in a series of picturesque scenes, he describes these immigrants in process of adaptation to a new style of life, and to a new milieu. The portrait differs notably from that of Martel and Wast; it is now one of honest, hard-working peasants who love the country which has received them.
Poets, too, in the same way as Gerchunoff, were interested in the Jews who peopled the Argentinian countryside. Leopoldo Lugones in his Oda a los ganados y a las mieses (1910) and Ruben Dario in his Canto a la Argentina (1910) sing the praises of the hard-working Jews. The same Leopoldo Lugones was to write, in 1936, the prologue to the Castilian edition of the book of Benjamin W. Segue] proving that The Protocols of the Elders of Zion was a fabrication. Without actually depicting an image of the Jew, Argentinian poets such as Fernandez Moreno (1915), Ezequiel Martinez Estrada, Alvaro Melian Lafinur and many others, portrayed the presence of the Jew in the country or in the town under a favourable light. The themes of persecution and the birth of the State of Israel inspired Arturo Capdevila, Alvaro Yunque and Rafael Alberti.
The first play for the theatre which has a specifically Jewish theme is El gaucho judio of Carlos Schaefer Gallo, presented in 1916. In this play there is a Jew who is more adapted to the Argentinian scene than the gauchos of Gerchunoff. To all appearances, he is a gaucho like the others, but persecution and misunderstanding follow him as they follow all sons of Israel.

3. A new image of the Jew appeared in the literature of Argentina in the figure of the immigrant son who tries to become integrated into the new milieu, in spite of the difficulties which this presents.
This subject was first treated by Manuel Calvet in the novel El mal metafisico (1916), and then in La tragedia de un hombre fuerte (:922). Galvez exalts the tenacity with which the young Jews try to educate themselves in the acts and sciences, thus contributing to local culture. It was this same Galvez who, in 1944, in his book Amigos y maestros de mi juventud, refuted such detractors of the Jews as Martel and Wast who accused them of dishonesty and avarice.
The novel by Bernardo Verbitsky Es difieil empezar a vivir introduces the son of an immigrant Jewish family, who, in 1932, tries to integrate himself into the life of Argentina. As an Argentinian he suffers the consequences of the social situation of the country, and as a Jew, he meets at every step the difficulties of the immigrant desirous of integrating and adapting himself as well as the injustice of discrimination.
More than once these same difficulties affect Jews who are less conscious of their faith and tradition, to the point where assimilation and integration are translated into rejection and forgetfulness of all that is Jewish. This is apparent in the play Requiem para un viernes a la noche (1964) by German N. Rozenmacher, in which the young son of an immigrant family decides to abandon home, family and tradition, so as to become integrated into all that is Argentinian, and thus no longer belong by halves to the country and remain a divided Jew.

4. The change of attitude in Jewish—Christian relations has had its repercussion on the literature of Argentina. In the novel Dos mil t:i2os en sombras (1968), Pilar Besc6s, describesa Christian girl fired by the principles of Vatican Council II and in love with a young Jewish immigrant, and the opposition of the two families who cannot believe in the sincerity of these relations. But, in this case, the accusation of dishonesty and avarice falls, paradoxically, on the mother of the Christian girl. This is a very faithful description of the present situation: while the older generation lives in the fear created by the memory of past repression, of prejudice manifested in distrust and rejection, the younger generation struggles to create a new climate of dialogue and collaboration.

5. To sum up, the literature of Argentina presents opposing images of Jewish characters. The first is that of the immoral, dishonest, avaricious Jew who aims at world domination, without questioning whether the means employed to achieve it are licit or not.
The second is that of the immigrant who adapts to a new way of living and brings his work and talent to the land which receives him, while being rejected and misunderstood. Here are depicted the ever-present difficulties and dangers of integration.
The first picture springs from fantasy, from prejudice and from ideas imported from other surroundings, and is not to be found in the Argentinian scene. The second picture is derived from the observation of familiar persons, and follows their gradual adaptation from the moment they decide to emigrate to Argentina to the birth and growth of the new generation in this country, and which provides different answers to the problem of double allegiance: of being at one and the same time Argentinian and Jewish.