Nostalgia Sunday

July 26, 2009 - 11:01 AM by Jessica · 1 Comment
Filed under: A New Reality, General, History and Culture, Immigrant Moments, Nostalgia Sunday

Sometimes it’s the dog days of summer, as you drift or, preferably, drive in a comfortably air-conditioned car, through the familiar streets of your neighborhood that you pay more attention to where you are and where you’re going.

Agnon's library

At least that’s what seems to have happened to a friend and neighbor of mine, Kenny Borsykowsky, who recently spent time putting together a fabulous document of historical photos and descriptions of our Jerusalem neighborhood of Talpiot. Most famously home to the early Israeli writer S.Y. Agnon, the Talpiot of yesteryear was, in essence, a Jerusalem suburb, as well as an outpost of sorts, guarding the border with Jordan. And for the residents, life was full of challenges. The bus, tells Kenny through an Agnon quote from The Fire and The Trees, came four times a day.

“And for the bus to come and go as scheduled 4 times a day. And what would [the driver] do if he had to consult with the neighbors? Indeed there was no telephone. He would take the shofar, climb onto the roof of his house and blow it, the neighbors would hear and come…”

That was later in the settlement of the area. Beforehand, in the 1900s, the entire area was a cluster of army bases and today’s Beitar Street was once a landing strip. Other points of interest? The Orthodox synagogue, commonly known as S.Y. Agnon, and where I have been attending one of the many daily minyanim in order to say kaddish for my father — more on that later — was named for Agnon, one of the first residents of the area. He was born in Galicia, moved to Jaffa in 1908, then to Berlin and back to Palestine in 1924, when he settled in Talpiot. He loved the neighborhood, as he wrote in The Sign:

“I stood among the little trees, all surrounded by gardens…Since I love the small houses and the refreshing gardens, I will tell their story.”

In The Sign he tells of a young veterinarian who wants to build his home in Talpiot, overlooking the desert with the Dead Sea in the distance:

“Descending from his donkey, he began hiking and walking, making his way among thorns and boulders, pondering in thought: ‘Imagine if I could make this place my home, together with my wife and children! But living here was impossible, far from town with neither any sign of settlement nor a living soul around, except for birds and insects.”

20464894[1].DSCN1906 Clearly, those times have long passed, as witnessed by the many residents, long lines of traffic in the morning hours and Egged buses passing through all day long. And Agnon got to witness his neighborhood’s changing facade as well, as witnessed by his decision to build the entrance of his own home away from the street, in order to reduce the noise entering his own home. It was from his home library that he worked, writing his books as well as the Prayer for the State of Israel, and he even convinced the city to make his street one-way (which it is to this day) to cut down on traffic and post a sign stating, “Please keep quiet: Writer at work!”