Emma Lazarus

Emma Lazarus

Infobox Person
name = Emma Lazarus


caption =
birth_date = birth date|1849|7|22|df=y
birth_place = New York City, New York
death_date = death date and age|1887|11|19|1849|7|22|df=y
death_place = New York, New York
Emma Lazarus (July 22, 1849 – November 19, 1887) was an American poet born in New York City.

She is best known for writing "The New Colossus", a sonnet written in 1883; its final lines were engraved on a bronze plaque in the base of the Statue of Liberty [Watts, Emily Stipes. "The Poetry of American Women from 1632 to 1945". Austin: University of Texas Press, 1977: 123. ISBN 0-292-76540-2] in 1912. The sonnet was solicited by William Maxwell Evarts as a donation to an auction, conducted by the "Art Loan Fund Exhibition in Aid of the Bartholdi Pedestal Fund for the Statue of Liberty" to raise funds to build the pedestal. cite book|title=Emma Lazarus in Her World: Life and Letters|first= Bette Roth|last=Young|year=1997|publisher = The Jewish Publication Society|id=ISBN 0-8276-0618-4 p. 3: Auction event named as " Lowell says poem gave the statue "a raison e'tre;" fell into obscurity; not mentioned at statue opening; Georgina Schuyler's campaign for the plaque ] [ cite book|title=Fifty Jewish Women Who Changed the World|first=Deborah G. |last= Felder|coauthors=Diana L Rosen|publisher=Citadel Press|year=2003|id = ISBN 0-8065-2443-X p. 45: Solicited by "William Maxwell Evert" [sic; presumably William Maxwell Evarts] Lazarus refused initially; convinced by Constance Cary Harrison ]

Background

Lazarus was the fourth of seven children of Moses Lazarus and Esther Nathan, Portuguese Sephardic Jewscite web| title = Jewish Women's Archive: Emma Lazarus| url= http://jwa.org/exhibits/wov/lazarus/el2.html|accessdate = 2008-01-10] whose families had been settled in New York since the colonial period. She was related through her mother to Benjamin N. Cardozo, Associate Justice of the US Supreme Court.

From an early age, she studied American and European literature, as well as several languages, including German, French, and Italian. Her writings attracted the attention of Ralph Waldo Emerson. He corresponded with her up until his death.

Lazarus is buried in Beth-Olom Cemetery in Brooklyn.

Literary career

She wrote her own original poems and edited many adaptations of German and Italian poems, notably those of Johann Wolfgang von Goethe and Heinrich Heine. She also wrote a novel and two plays.Quote_box
align=right
quote=The New Colossus Not like the brazen giant of Greek fame, With conquering limbs astride from land to land; Here at our sea-washed, sunset gates shall stand A mighty woman with a torch, whose flame Is the imprisoned lightning, and her name Mother of Exiles. From her beacon-hand Glows world-wide welcome; her mild eyes command The air-bridged harbor that twin cities frame. "Keep, ancient lands, your storied pomp!" cries she With silent lips. "Give me your tired, your poor, Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free, The wretched refuse of your teeming shore. Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me, I lift my lamp beside the golden door!"
source=Emma Lazarus, 1883|
Lazarus began to be more interested in her Jewish ancestry after reading the George Eliot novel, "Daniel Deronda", and as she heard of the Russian pogroms in the early 1880s. This led Lazarus to write articles on the subject. She also began translating the works of Jewish poets into English. Expelled in great numbers from the Russian Pale of Settlement, eastern European Ashkenazi Jews immigrated in destitute multitudes to New York in the winter of 1882. Lazarus taught technical education to help them become self-supporting.

She traveled twice to Europe, first in May 1885 after the death of her father in March and again in September 1887. She returned to New York City seriously ill after her second trip and died two months later on 19 November 1887, most likely from Hodgkin's disease.

She is known as an important forerunner of the Zionist movement. She argued for the creation of a Jewish homeland thirteen years before Herzl began to use the term Zionism. [ [http://www.wzo.org.il/en/resources/view.asp?id=1527&subject=28 Yearning for Zion] by Briana Simon (WZO Hagshama)]

Further reading

*Cavitch, Max. "Emma Lazarus and the Golem of Liberty," "American Literary History" 18.1 (2006), 1-28
* Eiselein, Gregory. "Emma Lazarus: Selected Poems and Other Writings". USA: Broadview Press, 2002. ISBN 1-55111-285-X.
* Jacob, H. E. "The World of Emma Lazarus". New York: Schocken, 1949; New York: Kessing Publishers, 2007, ISBN 1-43-2514-164.
* Lazarus, Emma. "Emma Lazarus: Selected Poems". USA: Library of America, 2005. ISBN 1-931082-77-4.
* Moore, H. S. "Liberty's Poet: Emma Lazarus". USA: TurnKey Press, 2004. ISBN 0-9754803-4-0.
* Schor, Esther. "Emma Lazurus". New York: Schocken, 2006. ISBN 0-8052-4216-3. [http://www.randomhouse.com/schocken/catalog/display.pperl?isbn=9780805242164]
* Young, B. R. "Emma Lazarus in Her World: Life and Letters". USA: Jewish Publication Society of America, 1997. ISBN 0-8276-0618-4.

References

External links

* [http://www.jwa.org/exhibits/wov/lazarus/ Women of Valor exhibit on Emma Lazarus] at the [http://www.jwa.org Jewish Women's Archive]
* [http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=6359435 Emma Lazarus, Poet of the Huddled Masses]
*
*Emma Lazarus Biography in [http://www.amuseum.org/jahf/virtour/page11.html Jewish-American Hall of Fame]


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