A reticent Chaim

Potok at the JCC Yiddish songs highlight a book fair opening marred by glitches and awkwardness.

PAT JOHNSON REPORTER

Eleanor Wachtel, one of Canada's foremost literary journalists, failed to crack the nut that is Chaim Potok. Wachtel, a CBC Radio host, interviewed the renowned author at the opening of the annual Cherie Smith JCC Jewish Book Fair Saturday, in an evening that was fraught with technical disasters.

Potok would not be drawn deeply into a discussion of his work. His answers to Wachtel's questions varied from abrupt to rambling, punctuated with uncomfortable silences.

In answer to a question about the motivation of a character in one of his novels, Potok replied simply, "I don't know."

Wachtel asked him why he kept returning to the issue of father-son relations.

"I keep returning to it, but I return to it from a different point of view," he responded, without much elaboration.

In response to a number of questions, Potok essentially suggested the answer would be found by reading the book and left it at that. One issue he did articulate was his struggle with his father over his choice to pursue literature. His father believed the only literature was the Torah and the Talmud; that anything else was worthless. When he was 21, Potok broke from the strict confines of his Orthodox upbringing by enrolling in the Jewish Theological Seminary, a Conservative institution. He added that the first secular literature he encountered was, by chance, about escaping insular societies. The first two novels he read were Brideshead Revisited and Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man - both of which are about casting off Catholic repression.

"And here I was," said Potok. "A closed individual in a modern world."

His work - especially his 1969 novel The Chosen - deals with the conflict between religious and secular impulses in Judaism. Potok acknowledged that he is not well liked by many Orthodox individuals, then he lambasted modern Orthodoxy as radically right-wing and unpalatable.

Potok read briefly from his new book, Old Men at Midnight. The section about his childhood relationship with a trope tutor reminded audience members of the power of Potok's written work.

In addition to whatever other problems occurred, the technical aspects Saturday night were particularly disappointing. The interview got off to a bad start when Wachtel and Potok had to sit on stage in the dark, waiting for the stage lights to be turned up, then still couldn't start for about 15 minutes while technicians tried to get the microphones to work. Wachtel adroitly filled the time with witty banter while Potok sat stone-faced. Once she began the interview, theatre crew could still be heard talking behind the scenes and Wachtel had to interrupt the interview before the noises stopped. The lighting crew had no more success. Among a series of miscues, a person on stage to interpret for the deaf was briefly left to do sign language in the dark.

A highlight of the evening was an engaging performance of Yiddish music by singer Claire Klein Osipov, accompanied by Wendy Bross Stuart on piano and Michael Braverman on clarinet.

Reisa Schneider, the JCC official who co-ordinates the annual book fair, acknowledged that she had mixed reactions to the evening.

"Many were delighted to have a writer of such renown visit Vancouver and be a part of our book fair and that was enough for them," she said. "Others found him intriguing. Yet others were terribly disappointed and found him rather dull and uninspiring. Some expected more intellect and more depth in his responses."

She concluded, however, that Potok's presence was memorable.

"All in all, I think that many would agree that they had an opportunity to meet someone who will go down in history as a legendary Jewish writer," she said. "No one can deny that this man's contribution to literature as a Jewish writer was significant."

The event launched the 17th annual book fair, which featured readings and lectures by a range of authors, as well as children's events, workshops and new and used book sales. Coverage of other events will be in next week's Bulletin.

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