Lazarus believed in the ideals of a free and just society for all, despite your origins. She fought for the secular as well as traditional Jewish liberation in society. In her advocacy for the poor, she spoke for rights of the domestic servant and other lowly paid workers in the American society. Her faith in America as a haven for all the downtrodden. She is today honored as being part of the early pioneers of the call for a Jewish homeland. Emma Lazarus (1849-1887), American poet, is best known as a spokesperson for the Jewish people. In the wake of the persecution in Europe, Lazarus opened a campaign for the establishment and return of the Jews to their homeland in Palestine. The first was Epistle to the Hebrews and her book Songs of a Semite. As such, she emerged as a brave spokesperson of the American Jewish community. Lazarus helped in the establishment of the Hebrew Technical Institute based in New York. She translated several important Jewish works, and 'The New Colossus' is inscribed on the pedestal of the Statue of Liberty. She helped the establishment of homes for the immigrant Jews escaping persecution in Europe. Raised in a wealthy Jewish family in New York, Emma Lazarus devoted herself to Zionist and Marxist causes after hearing about the pogroms in Russia in the 1880s. She took a keen interest in the persecution of Jews after the fall of the Russian monarchy.
She slowly moved away from the traditional Jewish writers to secular writers and poets.Īpart from writing and translating poems, Lazarus was an advocate for the rights of the Jewish people. As the years went by, she incorporated other writers from other European nations like Russia and Britain. Lazarus translated works of German, French and Italian Jews at the beginning of her career. She did her last publication in 1888 in Complete Poems with a Memoir.
After spending much of early 1880 traveling to Europe, Lazarus released another piece A Collection of Poems in Prose, in 1887. The pedestal bears some lines borrowed from her donated work. She was honored by the American government 16 years after her death. She donated the literary work for the fundraising of the pedestal on the Statue of Liberty. In 1883 she wrote one of her most known masterpiece The New Colossus. She emphasized this in her short story Eleventh hour and her poem How Long. She particularly encouraged young authors like Nathaniel Hawthorne and Harriet Stowe for breaking away from the European standards and creating the American uniqueness. She collaborated with other poets and writers to create a unique brand of a renaissance in the American literary circles. Apart from Heine’s work, Lazarus translated works of many other European poets. The original work belonged to the German poet Heinrich Heine. In 1881 she returned to publishing with a translation titled Poems and Ballads. The script titled Spagnoletto did not break through the commercial ranks. She tried publishing a drama script in 1876. In 1874 Lazarus released her maiden poetry prose titled Alide: An Episode of Goethe’s Life. She became a regular feature on the Lippincott’s Magazine and the Scribner’s Monthly. Emerson encouraged and supported her work in the years that followed. Her prowess attracted the attention of writer Ralph Emerson. She did another publication in 1871 under the title Admetus and Other Poems. She died in New York City on November 19, 1887, most likely from Hodgkin's lymphoma and was buried in New York City at Congregation Shearith Israel's Beth Olom Cemetery in Cypress Hills, Queens.In 1867 she published her first batch of poems under the title Poems and Translations. After the auction, the sonnet appeared in Joseph Pulitzer's New York World as well as The New York Times. In turn, Lazarus, inspired by her own Sephardic Jewish heritage, her experiences working with refugees on Ward's Island, and the plight of the immigrant, wrote "The New Colossus" on November 2, 1883. In 1883, William Maxwell Evarts and author Constance Cary Harrison asked Lazarus to compose a sonnet for the "Art Loan Fund Exhibition in Aid of the Bartholdi Pedestal Fund for the Statue of Liberty" - an art and literary auction to raise funds for the Statue's pedestal run by the American Committee for the Statue of Liberty. She was deeply moved by the plight of the Russian Jews she met there and these experiences influenced her writing. At Ward's Island, she worked as an aide for Jewish immigrants who had been detained by Castle Garden immigration officials. " Aside from writing, Lazarus was also involved in charitable work for refugees. National Park Service, Statue of Liberty NMīorn on Jin New York City to a wealthy sugar refining family of Portuguese Sephardic Jewish descent whose roots extended to the very early days of New York City as a British colonial city, Emma Lazarus was the poet who wrote "The New Colossus. Emma Lazarus was particularly affected by the condition of Russian Jews both in Eastern Europe and as immigrants on American shores.
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