Sholem Aleichem - Tevye the Dairyman and Motl the Cantor's Son

I don’t know if he’s the best, but he’s fast and cheap. My brother Elyahu has Shneur repair his fob watch about every other week. It’s a peculiar fob watch — either it runs crazy fast, or it slows down by an hour, or it stops altogether. It never seems to work right for long. Maybe my brother Elyahu should go to a different watchmaker, but Pinni says it’s probably the fob watch’s fault, not his uncle Shneur’s. Let’s face it, if the fob watch were just a regular watch, any watchmaker could fix it. But it isn’t a regular fob watch, so of what help can a watchmaker be?

You argue with him and tell him he’s wrong!

B.

My brother Elyahu’s friend Pinni is a smart person like his father Hersh-Leib the mechanic and like his uncle Shneur the clockmaker. He also has a long nose like them. It runs in the family.

They have an aunt Kryni who has a daughter Malkeh, and she has a nose that’s wondrous to see. Not only the nose, but her face as well — it’s more like a bird’s face than a person’s. She’s ashamed to go out into the street — a God’s pity on her! Pinni resembles her, but on a man it doesn’t matter. His face is so comical, you’d laugh just looking at him. It’s not enough that he’s tall and skinny — he has a pair of long ears, and a long neck like a gander, and he’s nearsighted in the bargain.

Wherever he goes, he bumps into someone. Whenever he stands up, he steps on someone’s foot. One trouser leg is always turned up, one sock is falling down, his shirt is always unbuttoned, and his necktie is off to the side. And when he speaks, he seems to gargle. He also has a sweet tooth, so that whenever you meet him, he’s sucking something.

For all that, he’s a very competent person. There’s nothing on earth he doesn’t know. He’s outdone the rabbi in learning. And his writing is better than that of all the scholars.

Besides having a fine handwriting, he’s an expert at rhymes. He’s always writing in rhyme. He’s written rhymes about everyone in town — the rabbi, the slaughterer, the councilors, the butchers, and even his own family. For a while Pinni’s rhymes passed from hand to hand, and people had a good laugh. Some even learned them by heart. I remember a few myself:

The whole town was rocking with these rhymes. Someone set this one to music, and the town was going around singing the tune until Shmuel Abba and his wife Nechama got wind of it. They sent for Hersh-Leib the mechanic and wept bitter tears. “What does your son Pinni have against us?” they cried.

Uncle Hersh-Leib the mechanic called Pinni into the house, locked the doors, and gave him a good dressing-down. He made him promise he’d never write any more rhymes as long as he lived.

C.

From that time on Pinni wrote no more rhymes. Rhymes didn’t enter his mind. As he tells it, he has many other problems to worry about. His father Hersh-Leib decided Pinni should get married and settle down. He arranged for Pinni to marry a miller’s daughter. The miller opened a shop for him that sold flour. My brother Elyahu envies him his business, but Pinni laughs at him, saying it’s a business but not for him. What kind of work is it, messing around with flour? It’s fit for an uneducated person like a miller. Is it his fault he can’t sit in the shop? He just can’t do it. His mind is restless, always working. He belongs to a family of restless minds.

That’s what Pinni says, and he refuses to look after the flour shop. He’d much rather sit over a book. His father-in-law is angry about it but keeps silent — he’s afraid his son-in-law will write rhymes about him. He also keeps in mind that his daughter Teibl is a delicate creature with a slightly crossed eye. She is a precious only daughter. My mother says she doesn’t have a mean bone in her body. But what does that mean? How can a bone be mean? All day she sits in the shop while Pinni sits at home. My brother Elyahu and I visit him every day, and he pours his heart out to us. He sighs and groans and bemoans his bitter luck. He feels hemmed in, he says, constrained. He’s being smothered. If he were in another town, it would be very different. If he could get out of here for even a year, he’d turn the world on its head!

D.

There’s no one he trusts as much as my brother Elyahu. He shows him his personal letters. Famous people write and tell him he has something special inside him, which Pinni too firmly believes. I look at him and wonder, God in heaven! What can he have inside him?

Once Pinni called my brother Elyahu aside to tell him a secret. If it’s a secret, I have to know it. I love to be in on secrets. So I walk right behind them and try to catch a few words. Pinni speaks, and then my brother Elyahu speaks. I’ll tell you what they both said:

PINNI: Why are we wasting our time here?

ELYAHU: I don’t know.

PINNI: Someone went there with nothing to his name, slept outdoors for half a year, and swept the streets for a piece of bread. I just read about it.

ELYAHU: And now?

PINNI: May it happen to both of us!

ELYAHU: Really?

PINNI: Really! Really! Do you think I’d lie to you? I’ve already spoken to my Teibl.

ELYAHU: What did she say?

PINNI: What should she say? She’s going.

ELYAHU: She’s going? Nu, and your father-in-law?

PINNI: Who listens to him? If I go alone, will it be better? He sees that I’m determined to go — I can’t stay here any longer!

ELYAHU: Neither can I!

PINNI: So let’s pack up and go!

ELYAHU: Pack up and go? With what money?

PINNI: Don’t be foolish — they’re giving out steamship tickets for free.

ELYAHU: What do you mean, for free?

PINNI: We pay in installments. We’ll pay it back fully one day. In the meantime we have them for free.

ELYAHU: Nu, and before we get to the ship? Expenses? Tickets? Train fare?

PINNI: How many tickets do we need?

ELYAHU: Yes, how many?

PINNI: Figure it out — I and my Teibl are two. You and your Bruche are two. That makes four.

ELYAHU: And my mother makes five.

PINNI: So it’s five.

ELYAHU: Nu, and Motl?

PINNI: He can get a half-fare ticket and maybe not even that. We can say he isn’t yet three years old.

ELYAHU: Are you crazy?

I can’t hold it in any longer. Out of great joy I let out a shriek!

Both turn around to me. “Go away, you imp! You have a bad habit of listening in when grown-ups talk!”

I run, skip, and slap my thighs with both hands. It’s no small matter — I’m going away!. . Ship!. . Train!. . Ticket!. . Half-fare ticket! Where are we going? I don’t know — what difference does it make? I’m going away — that’s enough! I’ve never gone anywhere in my life. I don’t know how “going away” feels. What does it mean? Once I rode around on my neighbor’s goat, but it cost me dearly — I fell off and bloodied my nose, and I collected a few slaps. So that trip doesn’t count.