Von Warschau nach New York. Die poetischen Passagen der Dichterin Kadya Molodowsky

Abstract

Molodowsky emigrated from Warsaw to New York in 1935. Her poetry evokes the experiences of estrangement and exile. Her poetic debut in 1920 already foreshadows a literary life-work which seeks to establish a close connection between religious tradition and secular ‚yidishkayt‘. Her earliest work also reflects social poverty and anti-Semitic terror, as well as the particular experiences affecting Jewish women, especially concerning the tensions they faced between the lure of emancipation and their religious family background. Molodowsky’s American work tends to highlight the threshold situation confronting recent immigrants, the impact of “the melting pot” on their lives and consciousness. At the same time it explores the impact of assimilation on the Yiddish language as a medium of tradition and identity, as well as the inevitable loss of collective memory by a society which tends to level both cultural and linguistic differences.