Their Stamp on Literature
It Came from November
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A stamp issued by Israel in 1970 (#412) depicts a scene from "The Dybbuk." The play was written by Shlomo Ansky (nee Shlomo Zanvil Rapaport), who died on November 9, 1920. The play, about a young suitor's spirit (or dybbuk) entering his beloved's body, was not produced until after Ansky's death. Also a folklorist, his works include poetry and stories originally written in Yiddish or Russian.
Several other Jewish authors are represented by stamps issued in November. One set depicts five illustrations for a children's story,
"King Matthew I," and the sixth stamp in the set depicts the author, Janusz Korczak. This set was issued by Poland in 1962 (#l098-1103). The author of that story was also honored on stamps issued by Israel in 1962 (#230), and by Germany on the 100th anniversary of his birth in 1978 (#1274). Poland also issued a stamp in 1978 depicting him in outline form walking with a child at each arm (#2293). This design represented
Korczak's heroism when he was the director of an orphanage in the Warsaw 
ghetto and chose to accompany the children to Auschwitz even though the Nazis had offered him his own freedom.
Another set of stamps depicting illustrations for children's books was issued by Israel in November 1984 (#893-5). And fictional detective, Ellery Queen, created by two Jewish cousins Frederic Dannay and Manfred Lee, was depicted on a stamp issued by Nicaragua in November 1972 (#C807).
In November 1956, Romania issued a stamp (#1129) depicting the German poet Heinrich Heine. Heine's relationship to his Jewish identity was complex.
He saw Judaism as both a religion a a "racial" category. His attitude toward the latter was always favorable -- he was proud of his heritage as a Jew and concerned about the welfare of the Jewish people. But his attitude toward Judaism as a religion varied over time. At first he was indifferent to it. But he became antagonistic to both Judaism and Christianity, especially after he converted to Lutheranism at the age of 28 to gain employment. He never believed in Christianity, and his animosity to Judaism increased because he viewed it as the progenitor of Christianity. However, he came to revere Judaism in his later years when he was ill and dying.
Boris Pasternak, who won the Nobel Prize for Lfterature in 1958, is
another author who was born a Jew, but who converted to Christianity. In November 1990, Sweden issued a stamp commemorating Pasternak (#1854). Pasternak was converted to Christianity by his nursemaid when he was a child. He expressed his Christian faith in some of his poetry. An example of his attitude towards Judaism was expressed in his novel "Doctor Zhivago," in which he advocated Jewish assimilation. Unlike Heine, he did not write on Jewish subjects and avoided discussion of his Jewish roots.
In sharp contrast, a November 1959 issue from Israel (#156) depicts Eliezer Ben Yehuda, who was the leader of the movement to revive Hebrew as a modern literary and spoken language. At the same time, Israel issued another commemorative (#154) honoring famed writer Sholom Aleichem. Among other works, Aleichem authored "Tevye the Dairyman." That short story later served as the inspiration for the play and film, "Fiddler on the Roof."
The November Connection
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