Pamięć dzieciństwa w sztetlu Połock w autobiografii Mary Antin Ziemia obiecana (1912)

Abstract

This article presents a study of the memory of childhood as presented by Mary Antin in her famous immigrant autobiography The Promised Land (1912) which was written in order to document Antin’s successful acculturation to American society. The first part of the autobiography focuses on the life of the Antin family in Polotzk in the Pale of Settlement, prior to their migration to the United States. In the article Antin’s brief biography and her book are presented, as well as a discussion of memory studies, relevant to Antin’s autobiography. The childhood in Polotzk as remembered and recreated by Antin was a mixture of dark emotions caused by anti-Semitism and poverty, connected with positive images of the integrity of the Jewish community, religious rituals and the beauty of the countryside experienced by young Antin. Her memories of childhood also show the ways in which children were prepared for their roles in the Jewish community and how to resist the oppression of the external hostile environment. The Promised Land, formally an autobiography, is largely a text constructed for the sake of the needs of American readers, which, however, does not affect its value as representation of childhood in a shtetl in the Pale of Settlement.