‘Laden With Happiness and Tears’ – Fiddler on the Roof in Historical Context

‘Laden With Happiness and Tears’ – Fiddler on the Roof in Historical Context
With historian and poet Anna Wrobel
Wednesday, April 19th | 6:30 – 7:30 PM
In person at the JCA – 1342 Congress St. 
Presented by the Jewish Community Alliance and Portland Ovations
Advanced registration required by Tues. April 18

Historical framing is set for the eventual uprooting of Tevye’s close knit community from “intimate, obstinate Anatevka,” to become “strangers in a strange new place.” After some generations of settled village life, “how swiftly flow the years.” By the turn of the 20th century, Jews of the Russian Pale were forced to wander and disperse once more. What seismic shifts – global, regional and local – would touch even the smallest and simplest of lives?

About the presenter: Anna Wrobel, daughter of Shoah survivors – partisan and soldier – is an American historian, teacher, poet and Holocaust Studies educator. Her works appear in Cafe Review, Lilith, Off the Coast and Jewish Currents. Anna has two poetry collections, Marengo Street (2012) and The Arrangement of Things (2018), published by Maine’s Moon Pie Press. Her poetry was included in the Holocaust Human Rights Center exhibit, Dilemma of Memory and the Maine Jewish History exhibit at the State Museum. She presented at Puffin Foundation on WWII Jewish resistance. Anna’s history and poetry works feature at the Jewish Community Alliance of Southern Maine, Maine Conference for Jewish Life, Maine Jewish Museum and USM’s OLLI Sage Lectures series. Poems taken from manuscript Sparrow Feathers: Second Generation/First Person are used by educators in several U.S. states, Poland, Germany and Israel. She’s taught American history and Holocaust Studies in high school, college and adult education. In times past, Anna studied theater, was a farmer-artisan, and worked as construction foreman. Two grown children were born, respectively, on a kibbutz in the Galilee and in Maine’s western mountains. Anna co-hosted the long running Lowry’s Lodge poetry series, with musician/writer Jim Donnelly.

Per the JCA’s COVID policy, proof of vaccination is required at our indoor programs. Masks are now optional.

Special discount for JCA community members!
Portland Ovations’ Broadway National Tour of Fiddler on the Roof

April 28 – 29, 2023 | 8 PM, 1 PM & 7 PM at Merrill Auditorium

Use the code “JCA” for 10% off tickets to any of the three performances of Fiddler on the Roof. Limit 4 per customer. Purchase tickets