Susan Sherman, The Little Russian, Counterpoint © 2012, ISBN 978-1-61902-070-2, 332 pages, $15.95
By Donald H. Harrison
This is an epic about Jewish survival in anti-Semitic Russia, in which the protagonist, Berta Lorkis, evolves from a self-important but poor relation in a rich relative’s home to a brave, self-sacrificing, single mother willing to risk nearly any danger to protect her two children.
Through her eyes and experiences we witness the sweep of early 20th – century Russian history—none of it pleasant from a Jewish standpoint. Author Susan Sherman vividly paints how Jews were routinely scape-goated and murdered in Russia, first under the czarist government, later during the Russian civil war, and finally under the newly established Bolshevik government.
She marries a wheat merchant named Herschel, who comes from a well-to-do family, but who insists on coming and going clandestinely as he attempts to organize Jewish communities to defend themselves against the peasants and Cossacks who amuse themselves by killing innocent Jews and looting their homes almost routinely during pogroms.
Discovery of Herschel’s activities forces him to flee, and although Berta and the children could have gone with him, she refused, miscalculating that after he established himself in America, he could send for them as many other husbands had done. However, World War I intervenes, followed by the Russian Revolution, and Berta soon finds herself increasingly desperate as the sole provider for her children Samuil and Sura.
One of the greatest values of this novel is its depiction of Berta’s metamorphosis from a self-centered, would-be social snob to a woman who throws aside her pretensions in order to survive. Once she had shopped at the finest stores, and had servants to do her bidding, but later in her life, she undergoes role reversal.
She becomes a peddler who procures goods and products desired by gentile customers, who refer contemptuously to her and to others in her trade as “house Jews.” Her social slide does not end there nor does her corresponding moral ascent. As life becomes ever more desperate for her and her children, readers cannot help but admire her for her determination and high sense of purpose.
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Harrison is editor of San Diego Jewish World. He may be contacted at donald.harrison@sdjewishworld.com