Editing Isaac Babel (section)

==Work==
===Early writings===
[[File:Isaac Babel 1908.jpg|thumb|right|Isaac Babel in 1908]]

In 1915, Babel graduated and moved to [[Saint Petersburg|Petrograd]], in defiance of laws restricting Jews from living outside the [[Pale of Settlement]]. Babel was fluent in French, besides Russian, Ukrainian and Yiddish, and his earliest works were written in French. However, none of his stories in that language have survived.

In St. Petersburg, Babel met [[Maxim Gorky]], who published some of Babel's stories in his literary magazine ''Letopis'' (''Летопись'', "Chronicle"). Gorky advised the aspiring writer to gain more life experience; Babel wrote in his autobiography, "I owe everything to that meeting and still pronounce the name of Alexey Maksimovich Gorky with love and admiration." One of his most famous semi-autobiographical short stories, "The Story of My Dovecote" (''История моей голубятни'', ''Istoriya moey golubyatni''), was dedicated to Gorky.

There is very little information about Babel's whereabouts during and after the [[October Revolution]]. According to one of his stories, "The Road" ("''Дорога''", "''Doroga''"), he served on the Romanian front until early December 1917. In his autobiography, Babel says he worked as a translator for the Petrograd [[Cheka]], likely in 1917.<ref>{{Cite book|last=Babel|first=Isaac|url=https://ruslit.traumlibrary.net/book/babel-ss04-01/babel-ss04-01.html|title=Исаак Эммануилович Бабель|publisher=Vremya|year=2005|isbn=5-9691-0154-0|pages=Autobiography section|language=Russian|quote=За это время я был солдатом на румынском фронте, потом служил в Чека, в Наркомпросе, в продовольственных экспедициях 1918 года, в Северной армии против Юденича, в Первой Конной армии, в Одесском губкоме, был выпускающим в 7-й советской типографии в Одессе, был репортером в Петербурге и в Тифлисе и проч.}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web|last=Freidin|first=Gregory|title=Isaac Babel, Russian author|url=https://www.britannica.com/biography/Isaac-Babel|access-date=June 11, 2021|website=Britannica}}</ref> In March 1918 he worked in [[Saint Petersburg|Petrograd]] as a reporter for Gorky's [[Menshevik]] newspaper, ''[[Novaya Zhizn (Mensheviks)|Novaya zhizn]]'' (''Новая жизнь'', "''New Life''"). Babel continued publishing there until ''Novaya zhizn'' was forcibly closed on Lenin's orders in July 1918.

Babel later recalled, <blockquote>"My journalistic work gave me a lot, especially in the sense of material. I managed to amass an incredible number of facts, which proved to be an invaluable creative tool. I struck up friendships with morgue attendants, criminal investigators, and government clerks. Later, when I began writing fiction, I found myself always returning to these 'subjects', which were so close to me, in order to put character types, situations, and everyday life into perspective. Journalistic work is full of adventure."<ref>''The Complete Works of Isaac Babel'', page 486.</ref></blockquote>

===October's Withered Leaves===
During the [[Russian Civil War]], which led to the Party's monopoly on the printed word, Babel worked for the publishing house of the Odessa Gubkom (regional [[CPSU]] Committee), in the food procurement unit (see his story "Ivan-and-Maria"), in the ''Narkompros'' (Commissariat of Education), and in a typographic printing office.

After the end of the Civil War, Babel worked as a reporter for ''The Dawn of the Orient'' (Заря Востока) a Russian-language newspaper published in [[Tbilisi]]. In one of his articles, he expressed regret that Lenin's controversial [[New Economic Policy]] had not been more widely implemented.

Babel married Yevgenia Gronfein on August 9, 1919, in Odessa, but by 1925, the Babels' marriage was souring. Yevgenia Babel, feeling betrayed by her husband's infidelities and motivated by her increasing [[anti-communism|hatred of communism]], emigrated to [[France]]. Babel saw her several times during his visits to [[Paris]]. During this period, he also entered into a long-term romantic relationship with Tamara Kashirina. A son they had together, Emmanuil Babel (1927-2000), was later adopted by his stepfather [[Vsevolod Ivanov]] and took the name Mikhail Ivanov, eventually becoming a noted artist.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.pseudology.org/babel/BabelSonIvanov.htm|title=babel son painter Ivanov|website=www.pseudology.org}}</ref>

After the final break with Tamara, Babel briefly attempted to reconcile with Yevgenia and in 1929 they had a daughter Nathalie, later Nathalie Babel Brown, who in adulthood became a scholar of her father's life and editor of his work. In 1932, Babel met a [[Siberian]]-born [[Gentile]] named [[Antonina Pirozhkova]] (1909–2010). In 1934, after Babel failed to convince his wife to return to Moscow, he and Antonina began living together. In 1939, their [[common law marriage]] produced a daughter, Lydia Babel.<ref>William Grimes, "[https://www.nytimes.com/2010/09/23/world/europe/23pirozhkova.html?_r=1&ref=obituaries Antonina Pirozhkova, Engineer and Widow of Isaac Babel, Dies at 101]," ''New York Times'', September 22, 2010.</ref>

According to Pirozhkova, <blockquote>"Before I met Babel, I used to read a great deal, though without any particular direction. I read whatever I could get my hands on. Babel noticed this and told me, 'Reading that way will get you nowhere. You won't have time to read the books that are truly worthwhile. There are about a hundred books that every educated person needs to read. Sometime I'll try to make you a list of them.' And a few days later he brought me a list. There were ancient writers on it, Greek and Roman—[[Homer]], [[Herodotus]], [[Lucretius]], [[Suetonius]]—and also all the classics of later European literature, starting with [[Erasmus]], [[Rabelais]], [[Cervantes]], [[Jonathan Swift|Swift]], and [[Charles De Coster|Coster]], and going on to 19th century writers such as [[Stendhal]], [[Mérimée]], and [[Flaubert]]."<ref>Antonina Pirozhkova, ''At His Side: The Last Years of Isaac Babel'', p. 45.</ref></blockquote>

===''Red Cavalry''===
In 1920, Babel was assigned to Komandarm (Army Commander) [[Semyon Budyonny]]'s [[1st Cavalry Army]], witnessing a military campaign of the [[Polish–Soviet War]] of 1920. He documented the horrors of the war he witnessed in the ''1920 Diary'' (''Конармейский Дневник 1920 года'', ''Konarmeyskiy Dnevnik 1920 Goda''), which he later used to write ''[[Red Cavalry]]'' (''Конармия'', ''Konarmiya''), a collection of short stories such as "Crossing the River Zbrucz" and "My First Goose". The horrific violence of ''Red Cavalry'' seemed to harshly contrast the gentle nature of Babel himself.

Babel wrote: "Only by 1923 I have learned how to express my thoughts in a clear and not very lengthy way. Then I returned to writing." Several stories that were later included in ''Red Cavalry'' were published in [[Vladimir Mayakovsky]]'s ''[[LEF (journal)|LEF]]'' ("ЛЕФ") magazine in 1924. Babel's honest description of the brutal realities of war, far from revolutionary [[propaganda]], earned him some powerful enemies. According to recent research, Marshal Budyonny was infuriated by Babel's unvarnished descriptions of marauding Red Cossacks and demanded Babel's execution without success.<ref>[[Donald Rayfield]], ''[[Stalin and His Hangmen]]'', page 217</ref> However, Gorky's influence not only protected Babel but also helped to guarantee publication. In 1929 ''Red Cavalry'' was translated into English by J. Harland and later was translated into a number of other languages.<ref>''The Oxford Companion to English Literature'', 6th Edition. Edited by Margaret Drabble, Oxford University Press, 2000</ref>

Argentine author and essayist [[Jorge Luis Borges]] once wrote of ''Red Cavalry'', <blockquote>The music of its style contrasts with the almost ineffable brutality of certain scenes. One of the stories—"Salt"—enjoys a glory seemingly reserved for poems and rarely attained by prose: many people know it by heart.<ref>Jorge Luis Borges, ''Selected Nonfictions'', page 164.</ref></blockquote>

===''Odessa Stories''===
[[File:Benya Krik.jpg|thumb|right|Benya Krik as portrayed by {{ill|Yuri Shumsky|ru|Шумский, Юрий Васильевич}} in the 1926 movie of the same name]]
Back in Odessa, Babel started to write ''[[Odessa Stories]]'', a series of short stories set in the Odessan [[ghetto]] of [[Moldavanka]]. Published individually between 1921 and 1924 and collected into a book in 1931, the stories describe the life of Jewish gangsters, both before and after the [[October Revolution]].<ref>{{Cite journal|last=Briker|first=Boris|date=1994|title=The Underworld of Benia Krik and I. Babel's "Odessa Stories"|url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/40870776|journal=Canadian Slavonic Papers / Revue Canadienne des Slavistes|volume=36|issue=1/2|pages=115–134|doi=10.1080/00085006.1994.11092049|jstor=40870776|issn=0008-5006}}</ref> Many of them directly feature the fictional [[mob boss]] [[Benya Krik]], loosely based on the historical figure [[Mishka Yaponchik]].<ref>{{cite book|last=Tanny|first=Jarrod|title=City of Rogues and Schnorrers: Russia's Jews and the Myth of Old Odessa|year=2011|publisher=Indiana University Press|location=Bloomington|isbn=978-0-253-22328-9|pages=ch. 3|url=http://www.iupress.indiana.edu/product_info.php?products_id=650630}}</ref> Benya Krik is one of the great [[anti-hero]]es of [[Russian literature]]. These stories were used as the basis for the 1927 film ''[[Benya Krik (film)|Benya Krik]]'', and the stage play ''[[Sunset (play)|Sunset]]'', which centers on Benya Krik's self-appointed mission to right the wrongs of Moldavanka. First on his list is to rein in his alcoholic, womanizing father, Mendel.

According to Nathalie Babel Brown, <blockquote>"''Sunset'' premiered at the [[Baku]] Worker's Theatre on October 23, 1927, and played in [[Odessa]], [[Kiev]], and the celebrated [[Moscow Art Theatre]]. The reviews, however, were mixed. Some critics praised the play's 'powerful anti-[[bourgeois]] stance and its interesting 'fathers and sons' theme. But in [[Moscow]], particularly, critics felt that the play's attitude toward the bourgeoisie was contradictory and weak. ''Sunset'' closed, and was dropped from the repertoire of the [[Moscow Art Theatre]].<ref>"The Complete Works of Isaac Babel," pages 753–754.</ref></blockquote>

However, ''Sunset'' continued to have admirers. In a 1928 letter to his [[White emigre]] father, [[Boris Pasternak]] wrote, "Yesterday, I read ''Sunset'', a play by Babel, and almost for the first time in my life I found that Jewry, as an ethnic fact, was a phenomenon of positive, unproblematic importance and power. ... I should like you to read this remarkable play..."<ref>''Boris Pasternak: Family Correspondence, 1921–1960'', Translated by Nicholas Pasternak Slater. [[Hoover Press]], 2011. Page 107.</ref>

According to Pirozhkova, filmmaker [[Sergei Eisenstein]] was also an admirer of ''Sunset'' and often compared it to the writings of [[Émile Zola]] for, "illuminating capitalist relationships through the experience of a single family." Eisenstein was also quite critical of the Moscow Art Theatre, "for its weak staging of the play, particularly for failing to convey to the audience every single word of its unusually terse text."<ref>''At His Side'', page 83.</ref>

===''Maria''===
Babel's play ''[[Maria (play)|Maria]]'' candidly depicts both [[political corruption]], prosecution of the innocent, and [[black market]]eering within Soviet society. Noting the play's implicit rejection of [[socialist realism]], [[Maxim Gorky]] accused his friend of having a "[[Baudelaire]]an predilection for rotting meat." Gorky further warned his friend that "political inferences" would be made "that will be personally harmful to you."<ref>''The Complete Works of Isaac Babel'', page 754.</ref> According to Pirozhkova, <blockquote>"Once Babel went to the [[Moscow Art Theater]] when his play ''Mariya'' was being given its first reading, and when he returned home he told me that all the actresses had been impatient to find out what the leading female role was like and who would be cast in it. It turned out that there was no leading female character present on the stage in this play. Babel thought that the play had not come off well, but ... he was always critical of his own work."<ref>Antonina Pirozhkova, ''At His Side; The Last Years of Isaac Babel'', Steerforth Press, 1996. Page 47.</ref></blockquote> Although intended to be performed in 1935, the ''Maria'''s performance was cancelled by the [[NKVD]] during rehearsals. Despite its popularity in the West, ''Maria'' was not performed in Russia until after the [[dissolution of the Soviet Union]].

[[Carl Weber (theatre director)|Carl Weber]], a former disciple of [[Bertolt Brecht]], directed ''Maria'' at [[Stanford University]] in 2004.
According to Weber, <blockquote>"The play is very controversial. [It] shows the stories of both sides clashing with each other during the [[Russian Civil War]]—the [[Bolshevik]]s and the [[Russian nobility|old society members]]—without making a judgment one way or another. Babel’s opinion on either side is very ambiguous, but he does make the statement that what happened after the [[Bolshevik Revolution]] may not have been the best thing for [[Russia]]."<ref>[http://daily.stanford.edu/article/2004/2/26/babelsMariaMakesUsDebutAtPigott Maria's American Debut] {{webarchive |url=https://web.archive.org/web/20060915231505/http://daily.stanford.edu/article/2004/2/26/babelsMariaMakesUsDebutAtPigott |date=September 15, 2006}}</ref></blockquote>