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Israel Zangwill

British author (1864–1926)

Israel Zangwill (February 14, 1864 – August 1, 1926) was an English humorist and writer.

"A Child of the Ghetto"
Zangwill as caricatured by Walter Sickert in Vanity Fair, February 1897

Quotes

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  • No Jew was ever fool enough to turn Christian unless he was a clever man.
    • Children of the Ghetto (1892), bk. 1, ch. 7.
  • Scratch the Christian and you find the pagan — spoiled.
    • Children of the Ghetto (1892), bk. 2, ch. 6.
  • No... the real American has not yet arrived. He is only in the Crucible, I tell you—he will be the fusion of all races, perhaps the coming superman.
  • America is God's Crucible, the great Melting-Pot where all the races of Europe are melting and re-forming!
    • The Melting Pot, act 1.
  • Oh, for the simple life,
    For tents and starry skies!
    • Aspiration.
  • The past is our cradle, not our prison, and there is danger as well as appeal in its glamour. The past is for inspiration, not imitation, for continuation, not repetition.
    • The Voice of Jerusalem, Macmillan, 1921, p. 270

Poem: Blind Children

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  • An Edward's England spat us out - a band
    Foredoomed to redden Vistula or Rhine,
    And leaf-like toss with every wind malign.
    All mocked the faith they could not understand.
  • How full and rich a world
    Theirs to inhabit is—
    Sweet scent of grass and bloom,
    Playmates’ glad symphony,
    Cool touch of western wind,
    Sunshine’s divine caress.


    How should they know or feel
    They are in darkness?


    But, oh, the miracle!
    If a Redeemer came,
    Laid finger on their eyes—
    One touch and what a world,
    New-born in loveliness!
  • What a dark world—who knows?—
    Ours to inhabit is!
    One touch and what a strange
    Glory might burst on us,
    What a hid universe!

See also

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