Lazarus, Emma, 1849-1887

Emma Lazarus (July 22, 1849 – November 19, 1887) was an American author of poetry, prose, and translations, as well as an activist for Jewish and Georgist causes. She is remembered for writing the sonnet "The New Colossus" in 1883.[1] Its lines appear inscribed on a bronze plaque, installed in 1903,[2] on the pedestal of the Statue of Liberty.[3] The last lines of the sonnet were set to music by Irving Berlin as the song "Give Me Your Tired, Your Poor" for the 1949 musical Miss Liberty, which was based on the sculpting of the Statue of Liberty (Liberty Enlightening the World). The latter part of the sonnet was also set by Lee Hoiby in his song "The Lady of the Harbor" written in 1985 as part of his song cycle "Three Women".

Lazarus was also the author of Poems and Translations (New York, 1867); Admetus, and other Poems (1871); Alide: An Episode of Goethe's Life (Philadelphia, 1874); Poems and Ballads of Heine (New York, 1881); Poems, 2 Vols.; Narrative, Lyric and Dramatic; as well as Jewish Poems and Translations.[4]

Born on July 22, 1849 in New York City, Emma Lazarus was the fourth of seven surviving children to Sephardic-Ashkenazi parents Moses and Esther (Nathan) Lazarus. Lazarus was most likely privately tutored; she was proficient in German, French, and Italian. Her Jewish education consisted of knowledge of the Bible and observing a form of Sabbath and holidays, but as one of Lazarus’ associates said “the religious side of Judaism had little interest for Miss Lazarus, or for any member of her family.”

Lazarus began composing poetry inspired by classical themes in her teen years. In 1867, her father published her first book: Poems and Translations, Written between the Ages of Fourteen and Sixteen. By 1877, Lazarus was pursuing a career as a “lady magazine poet,” contributing poetry to Lippincott Magazine and Independent among others, as well as publishing a collection of poetry (Admetus and Other Poems,which includes a title poem dedicated to her correspondent, critic and advisor Ralph Waldo Emerson); an historical tragedy set in Italy in 1655 (The Spagnoletto); and a novel (Alide, An Episode of Goethe’s Life).

Historians differ as to the sharpness of change Lazarus experienced while switching her focus from Grecian idealism to Jewish immigrant and Zionist causes. According to Dan Vogel’s Emma Lazarus:

“The awakening of her Jewish consciousness, however, was really not quite so sudden. It was more a matter of a latent seed developing slowly and sporadically, and suddenly sprouting forth. The stages, in fact, may be traced in poems written over a period of fifteen years.”

Vogel refers to several poems, among them “In the Jewish Synagogue at Newport,” which was written in July 1867 and published in Admetus and Other Poems. “In the Jewish Synagogue at Newport” follows Henry Wadsworth Longfellow’s “The Jewish Cemetery at Newport” in form and meter, but unlike Longfellow’s conclusion that “the dead nations never rise again,” Lazarus insists there is still holiness in “the sacred shrine.” “In Memoriam: Rev. J.J. Lyons: Rosh Hashana 5638” written in April 1877, compares Lazarus’ Uncle, Jacques Judah Lyons, minister of the Congregation Shearith Israel, to the offering of first fruits given in the ancient temple. 1877 was also the year Lazarus was approached by Rabbi Gustav Gottheil of the Reform Temple Emanuel to translate prior German translations of three medieval Jewish poets for his hymnal. Lazarus agreed, hesitantly, fearing her lack of religious feeling would not give credit to their work. All of these beginnings seemed to whet Lazarus’ appetite for Jewish history, culture and Zionism.

An interesting record of Lazarus’ change in perspective towards Judaism is apparent in her essays written on Heinrich Heine. Lazarus held an early respect for the work of the German poet who was born Jewish and converted superficially to Lutheranism in order to attend medical school. Heine continued to struggle with his Jewish identity throughout his life. Lazarus translated several of his poems and published Heinrich Heine: Poems and Ballads in 1881. Lazarus’ two biographical and critical essays on Heine written in 1881 and 1884 demonstrate her shift of perspective; in the early essay she views Heine’s defense of Jewish causes as a coincidence of an overall belief in civil liberties and later changes her view and sees his defense as a direct expression of his Jewishness. In her 1884 essay “The Poet Heine,” published in Century, she describes him as “…a Jew with the mind and eyes of a Greek.”

As the pogroms in Russia entered public awareness, Lazarus became highly involved in her personal and professional life in combating anti-Semitic persecution. In 1880, she wrote two dramatic representations of Rashi’s life entitled “Raschi in Prague” and “Death of Raschi.” She began visiting Eastern European immigrants on Ward’s island in 1881, and became involved in efforts to create the Hebrew Technical Institute and agricultural communities for Jewish immigrants. Between 1882 and 1884, Lazarus published twenty-two essays and two editorials concerning Zionism, religious life and anti-Semitism in America. Songs of a Semite, a collection of poems and translations focusing on the above themes and previously printed in the American Hebrew and Jewish Messenger was published in 1882. A series of fourteen essays printed in 1882-1883 in The American Hebrew entitled “Epistles to the Hebrews” was posthumously published in 1900 as a book by the Federation of American Zionists. The essays outlined her Zionist ideas and plans that entailed Jewish centers in both the United States and Palestine. Lazarus' single experimentation in free verse is recorded in a series of poems entitled “By the Waters of Babylon,” written in 1883 and published in 1887. Lazarus's most famous work "The New Colossus," was created for an 1883 auction to help fund the pedestal for the Statue of Liberty (the U.S. Congress agreed to erect the statue, but not to build the pedestal). Before she completed “The New Colossus,” Lazarus worked on one less successful poem which contained similar themes and images, particularly “Gifts.” Despite the fact that the poem was read aloud at the December 3, 1883 auction, when the statue was installed and dedicated on October 28, 1886, no mention was made of the poem. In 1903, 20 years after the poem was written, Emma Lazarus's friends successfully led a campaign to have it engraved on the pedestal.

In 1883, before she wrote “The New Colossus” and “By the Waters of Babylon,” Lazarus fulfilled a long cherished dream and visited England. She met several significant people, including Robert Browning and William Morris. In August 1884, the first signs of Lazarus’ illness appeared. Her father’s death in 1885 greatly devastated her, and Lazarus again sailed to Europe to recover. She stayed in Europe for two years, visiting Holland, France, Italy. She wrote only two poems during her stay. She returned to New York on July 31, 1887 seriously ill with cancer. Lazarus passed away on November 19, 1887 and was buried in the family plot in Congregation Shearith Israel’s cemetery. She was 38 years old. Her death was memorialized in several sonnets and letters published in literary magazines. The American Hebrew published a memorial issue on December 9, 1887. The Poems of Emma Lazarus, a two-volume selection of poems and translations compiled by her sisters, was published in 1889.