Adam Hochschild on Molly Crabapple in NYRB: ‘One place to which the Bund did not spread was Palestine, for it fiercely opposed Zionism. Its members believed that Jews should fight for full rights wherever they were, not in a new homeland somewhere else. Here Where We Live Is Our Country takes its title from a Bund slogan. The organization celebrated “hereness,” doikayt in Yiddish. Its members wanted not for God “to lead them again out of Egypt, but to help them free Egypt.” A fine ideal, but freeing the Egypts of the world turned out to be a tall order.’

And: ‘In a sense, the Bund failed. The socialist commonwealth so many of its members fervently hoped for did not come to pass. The workers of the world did not unite.’

There is something to be said for ‘hereness’, but also for the willingness to become a nomad.

(a sf 2128)