Who: Bel Kaufman is a New York City-based author, who spent three decades teaching in NYC’s public school system. Up the Down Staircase, her 1965 debut novel, was inspired by a 3 1/2-page short story, From a Teacher’s Wastebasket, and was lauded within Time magazine as “easily the most popular novel about U.S. public schools in history.” The writing profession shaped Kaufman’s life from the beginning. She is the granddaughter of Yiddish author Sholem Aleichem (upon whose stories, Fiddler on the Roof is based). Her mother, Lyalya was the only one of Aleichem’s six children to also pursue a literary career — including over thirty years publishing short works in Forverts [The Forward], NYC’s weekly Yiddish newspaper. In August of 1948, Kaufman joined her mother and grandfather in print notoriety with the publication of her short story, La Tigresse in Esquire magazine. However, Esquire was not known for publishing female authors. So, at her agent’s suggestion, she submitted La Tigresse under a shortened first name — from ‘Bella’ to ‘Bel’. Kaufman then adopted the pen name as her own. From a Teacher’s Wastebasket was published in The Saturday Review in November of 1962, and attracted the attention of Prentice-Hall editor Gladys Justin Carr, who convinced Kaufman to expand it into a novel. In 1967, Warner Brothers bought the rights to Up the Down Staircase, and adapted it (with Kaufman as a consultant) into a film starring Sandy Dennis as “Sylvia Barrett” — a young English teacher at an urban public school. Kaufman received a brief cameo in the film as a fellow teacher clocking into work. But the success of the novel opened a new chapter in Kaufman’s life. Up the Down Staircase proved to be a best-seller for 64 weeks, and has sold over 6 million copies. Kaufman’s other books include Love, Etc., focusing on a divorced female author dealing with past, current and (literary) fictional loves lost. It also features plenty of Kaufman’s humor. She shared that talent with a new generation when, in 2011 at the age of 99, she began teaching a course on Jewish humor at her alma mater of Hunter College on Manhattan’s Upper East Side. I interviewed Bel for The Jewish Channel that Spring, and asked about her memories of Aleichem, her favorite authors and poets, and her thoughts on humor. On Sunday March 10th, 2013 — two months short of her 102nd birthday — Kaufman was honored for “Making Trouble/Making History” by the Jewish Women’s Archive. She delivered an acceptance speech about her career, and the perks of old age…

Bel Kaufman’s speech at the Third Annual Jewish Women’s Archive Luncheon:

It’s a great honor you’re giving me today, and I’m quite touched by it. I’m not sure why I am celebrated by you. Is it because I’m a Jewish woman? Is it because I am old, sort of long in the tooth? Today is the 10th of March. In two months, on May 10th, I’ll have a birthday. I’ll be 102. How did I get to be so old? I don’t know. But I’ll tell you something. I like it. I absolutely like being this old. And I’ll tell you why. All my life, I’ve had to do something that I had to do. I had to study. I had to go to school. I had to have a job. I had to teach. I had to marry, have children, work. For the first time in 101 years, I don’t have to do anything. What a wonderful, wonderful feeling — a liberating feeling. I can say, when I’m asked to do something, “No thank you.” “Why not?” “I’m 101.” What a great excuse. Provided, of course, one is healthy. And that’s a huge proviso. And I have been fortunate. I’m aware of the fact that I don’t have much time. My future has become my past. And so, my priorities are different. I value time. What’s important to me now is my family, is doing what I enjoy to do, even if it’s nothing. What a wonderful feeling it is to do nothing. But I have been busy. As you will see later, I’ve been busy translating all of my books into digital books. And they’re here today. I’ll be signing them. But besides being old… I like that word, ‘old.’ Not ‘senior.’ That’s a high school prom word. Not ‘older.’ Older than whom? Old. A very honorable word. I like it. And I wish all of you would have reached this ripe age. As I said, provided your healthy. That’s a huge proviso. Because I’m aware of the harsh realities. I’m aware of the problems in the market place. I’m aware of the premium on youth. But old age has its huge advantages. I remember the Browning line. “Grow old along with me. The best is yet to be. The last of life for which the first is made.” I always thought, “What a ridiculous sentence,” when I was young. I realize how true it is. All the struggles and problems of youth are behind me. Children are grown and on their own. And for the first time, one has opportunities to do what one wants, but not what one is supposed to do. So I’m enjoying this. And I’m enjoying particularly being with you today. Aging is a matter of mind over matter. If you don’t mind, it doesn’t matter. And I don’t mind. I tell my age, and it’s a sort of “Open Sesame” to how kind people are. When I cross a street, they come to help me. When I’m looking for a place to sit, they offer me a seat. I wish all of you will reach this age that you will understand what I am saying.

As far as my books are concerned — which are all here today, and I will be signing them later — for the first time in my life, I have collected my short stories. Actually, my novels are in a way short stories. Up the Down Staircase, which made my success, was an accident. I had published short stories in national magazines. One of them was a little 3-page story called From a Teacher’s Wastebasket, in which I had jotted down some scraps of paper, which juxtaposed together showed a picture of waste, of lack of communication, of discipline problems, of loneliness. And that was published. Prentice Hall, the publisher, had an editor who recognized something in that little 3 1/2 page story. Called me to have lunch, and asked me to expand it into a book. I said, “Oh, no, no, no. I’ve never written a novel. I’m a teacher of English,” I used to say it with great pride, “and a short story writer.” But they gave me an advance, which I immediately spent. I needed to spend it. I didn’t have a penny. I had left my husband. I had no savings. I spent the advance. What could I do? I had to write the book. It was guilt. That was my motivating fact. And I was very surprised when I discovered that as soon as the book was published, it became a national best-seller. And it’s still alive, and it is still very significant today. Well, what used to be a mischievous spitball is now a rebellious rock. What used to be stealing chalk, is now robbery at knife-point. What used to be infractions, like chewing gum in class, smoking in the lavatory, become crimes that our children commit. I think the difference has to do with a drug culture. Up the Down Staircase had no drug problems. At least, not many. It was a straw in the wind. And the wind is now a hurricane. As soon as the book was published, I became known as “the author of”, and I found myself known. Especially by teachers all over the country, who said, “How did you know? You described my class, my students, my problem.” And I treasure all the letters that they sent me.

It was bound to become a movie. And two moving picture companies bargained for it: 20th Century Fox and Warner Brothers. And Warner Brothers won. I was the technical consultant. That meant they let me hang around, they paid me, they didn’t listen to a word I said. They transformed a high school in Manhattan, Textile High School Annex for Boys on 10th Ave., into the school I describe in Staircase. Inside, they had names of the teachers I invented. Inside, they had classes, and the numbers of the rooms I invented. And I remember seeing all those people scurrying around — actors, directors, script girls, makeup people — all of them working. Why? Because one day I had sat down at my typewriter and put a blank piece of paper into it. And that was the beginning. And so many of us who have thoughts about expressing something that you feel, about possibly writing it — perhaps you take notes and you leave them around, perhaps you jot down ideas — those may be the seeds from which would grow a creative work of art. I have written another novel, Love, Etc., which has to do with us grownups, and I like it very much. It’s a very good book. I believe that’s out here today too. As well as two volumes of my short stories. Some of it appeared in magazines throughout the years. I never collected them in one volume. And my nonfiction pieces, random thoughts and observations called This and That. I believe all four books are here today: This and That, Love, Etc., La Tigresse, which is my short story volume, and Up the Down Staircase. And I believe that they are available today after my talk. I was given 5-7 minutes in which to talk. I remember asking a class to write about 100 words, so I could tell what their weaknesses were in English. One boy wrote a few lines, “Eighty-five words so far. Need fifteen more.” I don’t need fifteen more. I think that I have communicated with you. And if I talked for 5-7 minutes, if I talked an extra half-a-minute, I hope you will forgive me. I thank you, thank you, thank you.

Bel Kaufman’s March 2011 interview with The Jewish Channel about her Jewish humor course:

It’s a small group. I’d prepared a series of brilliant hour-and-a-half lectures. When I saw the small group of such nice-looking people, I discarded my lectures, I got us to sit in a small circle, and just talk. So we talked about Jewish humor, and I was very funny. But they didn’t laugh much. You know why? They were taking notes. I guess they’re accustomed to do that. Well, I enjoyed it. Because there’s something very special about Jewish humor. First of all, because Jews have been persecuted so long in so many places, so many stages of history, they had to develop a defense mechanism. “Oh, so you think we’re cheap, huh? I’ll show you what cheap is…” And they begin to be self-punishing, self-critical, making fun of themselves. That’s a good mechanism. “Before they can say that, I’ll say something even better.”

My grandfather, Sholem Aleichem, I can talk about him because I’m very old. And I am the only one alive who remembers him — I was three, I was four — nobody else does. When I’m gone, there’ll be nobody who sat on his lap, or listened to his voice, or felt the warmth of his hand when we would walk. He used to tell me the tighter I held onto his hand, the better he wrote. So if you enjoy his work [points to herself] I get the credit. I held on very tightly.

We spoke Russian at home. We weren’t in a shtetl where Yiddish was the language. We lived in large cities — Odessa, Kiev, Moscow, Geneva — and the language that we spoke was Russian. Although, we understand Yiddish. When Sholem Aleichem would finish a story, he’d put on his best clothes and he would say, “I am finished with a story.” Oh, we got so excited! We fought each other for who would sit closer to him, and he would read in Yiddish. We were his first audience. Actually, he made of Yiddish — which used to be a kind of kitchen language — a language of literature. I think that’s very important to know.

I speak a little English, as you can gather. I speak the Czar’s Russian. That’s my real language. I speak French, but my accent is not perfect. When I speak a language, I like to speak it perfectly. So I read French, and I’m wary of speaking it. What else? German. I was born in Berlin. Because my father was studying medicine then. They had better schools than in Russia. So for my first three years, all I heard was German. Then in college, that’s here in Hunter, I took German as well as French. I used to know Hebrew, because Sholem Aleichem wrote to my mother, “I’d like little Bellatchka to learn Hebrew so that she would read a great poet, Chaim Nahman Bialik.” Bialik was a good friend of the family. On my first visit to Israel at the Israel airport, Bialik’s wife Mania came to greet me. They had moved to Israel, and he had already died. She wanted to pay me a complement. Here I am, a grown woman with a pocketbook. She saw me last in Odessa when I was 7. “Bellatchka, you haven’t changed at all.” She thought that would make me feel good.

My favorite Sholem Aleichem book is the first book I read in Russian translation, Mottel: The Cantor’s Son. And then the sequel, Mottel in Kasrilovka. The little Mottel is one of the most marvelous inventions. People compare him with Huck Finn. No, he was unique. I love those stories. I almost know them by heart. I like his Tevye stories. If you ask me about Fiddler on the Roof, I think it’s a very thrilling, beautiful, exciting musical written by two brilliant people — Sheldon Harnick the lyricist, and Jerry Bock the composer. But it has nothing to do with Sholem Aleichem. Tevye was a tragic character in Sholem Aleichem’s stories. The shtetl was not the beautiful setting that you saw on the stage or screen. Life was very difficult. But the musical is brilliant. Not Sholem Aleichem’s shtetl. It doesn’t matter, because it introduced people. “A writer called Sholem Aleichem? What else did he write?” Ah!

His laughter was so wonderful. I’m unhappy about so much of Jewish humor that got vulgarized through those stand-up comics with no taste. It hurts me. But I hope my students will know the difference between real humor that springs from a character or a situation, or silly memorized jokes. Sholem Aleichem’s humor was thumbing the nose at adversity, turning tables on tragedy, losing everything but winning the argument. His stories, mostly monologues. He was a verbal, an oral writer. It wasn’t so much what was happening that was funny, but what people said about it. And his humor is delicious.

Is Russian a good language for humor? I was [in Russia] many times as an adult. When Gorbachev was in power, he used to invite me to talk at the writers union, and they were all Russians. One of them asked me in Russian, “Are you familiar with your American writer, John ‘oop-dik’?” — John Updike. Well anyhow, I enjoyed those visits. The Russians, who were afraid to criticize their government, used humor. For example, they have a joke about a diner in a restaurant who says to the waiter, “You look very familiar. Did we go to college together?” The waiter says, “I never went to college.” [diner says,] “Ah, we were in the war together.” [waiter says,] “I was not in the war.” [diner says,] “How do I know you? Ah, I remember. You served me my appetizer today.” Instead of saying, “Lousy service,” it’s a joke. So the Russian jokes are self-critical about themselves, but in an anecdote.

On other Jewish writers she admires?

Well, I met many of them, and I knew many of them, because I’ve been around almost 100 years. Oh, how did I get so old? I knew Isaac Bashevis Singer. Singer was a very funny man. He was an ardent vegetarian. And I think Saul Bellow called him a “vegetarian satyr”, because he was very involved in sex — personally and in his writing. I once invited him to a cocktail party. He said, “Can I come without Alma”, that was his wife, “and pinch the girls?” He came without Alma, and he pinched the girls. Well, he’s important. He got his Nobel Prize I think in ’78, and he read his speech in Yiddish. That was quite remarkable. Bellow got it in ’76. I knew Bellow. I had a crush on Bellow. He was very good looking in his young years.

Writers used to gather in our home in Odessa, and we would have tea. Most of them were the Russian-Jewish backgrounds. I was in Russia during the Russian Revolution in 1917. Dead bodies on the street, frozen. Famine. Green bread made from peas. There was no flour. But you know, a child has no basis for comparison. Doesn’t every little girl step over a frozen dead body? It was only when the grownups were worried, I got concerned. I began writing early. I published my first poem when I was seven in a Russian children’s magazine. Would you like to hear it? “It’s very dull to sit at home, when outside is Spring.” It loses a lot in translation.

I wrote a lot at Hunter. I wrote for the magazine, Echo. I wrote for the graduate book, Wistarion. I wanted to be a teacher. In my first class in public school when I was 12, I knew not a word of English. I was put in 1A with all the little Seven year-olds. I tried to understand what was being said, and in a couple of months I caught on. The teacher, I remember her name, Ms. Murphy. Bless Ms. Murphy. I was a shy foreign girl, and knew no one. I tried to say something in English, and the children giggled. It must have sounded funny. And she said to me, “You have a very beautiful voice.” If that’s how teachers in America are, I’d like to be one. And at Hunter, I never took education courses. But a friend of mine whom I loved very much, Elizabeth, I visited her class once, and there were the little ones. They were sitting there looking at me, waiting. What were they waiting for? Something from me. They were waiting for me to give them something. And all those eyes waiting were so moving. I said, “Oh, I want to do this all the time.” I never taught little ones, but it was a remarkable feeling. “I can give them something they may remember.” Hunter was wonderful in many ways. In what other college can you go from room to room to different classes, and recite your favorite poem to a listening audience? We had that.

My favorite Russian poet is everybody’s favorite — [Alexander] Pushkin. Pushkin is wonderful. Died in a stupid duel when he was very young. My favorite English poet… I hate to say it, because the others would feel hurt. I like them too. But I’ll talk of the dead ones. That’s safer, isn’t it? T.S. Eliot, I had committed to memory the entire Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock. I’ll recite it at the drop of a hat. All of Eliot I have found very exciting. I love [John] Keats much more than [Percey Bysshe] Shelley. I love Keats’ odes, and I’ve committed some to memory. I love Emily Dickinson. Mysterious lady, but a remarkable poet. I could continue, but these are the ones I go back to.

On how she stays so active:

I’m too busy to grow old. When I have time, I’ll sit down and start getting old. I’ve too much to do outside of myself. I’m interested in people and places and books. Life is interesting.