Bread Givers
Clashing Values in a Society: Conflicts within Reb Smolinsky in Anzia Yezierska's Bread GiversValues and status are linked together in every society. Status is given to the persons who embody the values of that social construct. The values of the Old Country, Russia, were those of spiritual and religious piousness and learning. Therefore those who studied religion, like Reb Smolinsky, were among those who held the highest status. However, in America, these values were not the same. Immigrants soon learned of the capitalist nature of a materialistically driven land where whoever had the most wealth held the most status. The question arises, what happens when people in a society with one set of values enter a society with different values? To assimilate successfully, the immigrant's values must undergo a change. In her novel Bread Givers, Anzia Yezierska tells the tale of an immigrant family who has difficulty coping with such a clash of values. Reb Smolinsky in particular is a character that craves his status so much so that he changes his values in America and adopts something he doesn't understand, thus ruining his family. Jews in Russia lived differently than they did as immigrants in America. In Russia they lived in sht
Yezierska expert Alice Kessler-Harris states, "In America pious poverty earned no approbation" (Kessler-Harris xviii). He wanted to buy himself honor in the family. But then hard times fell upon the family and they were forced to immigrate to America. But to his own dismay, he finds that America does not hold this same ideal to be true. It is easy to judge the values of this community through its actions. I want to get into some quick money-making thing that will not take up too many hours a day, so I could get most of my time for learning (Yezierska 111). Instead, Father marries his daughters to men whom he thinks have wealth. Clearly the Landlady does not value Torah study enough to merit Father not working. Mother claims, "If he was only so fit for this world, like he is fit for Heaven, then I wouldn't have to dry out the marrow from my head worry for the rent" (Yezierska 16). And yet my own daughter who is not a Jewess and not a gentile - brings me a young man- and whom? An American. " (Ferraro 560) She has pursued her own dreams and becomes a schoolteacher, yet she does this the American way. Thus he attempts to marry his daughters into money so that he can also benefit from their unions and become rich himself. She informs her daughter of the riches she once had, and tells the story of how she was engaged to marry Reb Smolinsky. Mother says, "When everything was gone from us, then our only hope was to come to America, were Father thought things cost nothing at all" (Yezierska 34). Ferraro, Yezierska critique says in 'Working Ourselves Up' in America: Anzia Yezierska's Bread Givers, "It is [Reb] Smolinsky (with increasing enthusiasm) whodictates the terms, methods, and goals of what Bessie the eldest calls 'working ourselves up'" (Ferraro, 554).
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Acceptance Essays
