When Lia Joffe visited Cambridge in Year 11, it wasn't the majesty of New Court that caught her eye, it was the side gate at the original entrance to the College on Bene't' Street. "I just though it was a very cool entrance to the College. And I liked the keys." She matriculated at Corpus in 2022 and the College has turned out to be a good fit for more than its entranceways. Lia is reading History, and she has a particular interest in religious history. Studying the Reformation, especially at Corpus, where figures such as Matthew Parker were central to the development of Elizabethan religious identity, made her very aware of how much Cambridge itself was shaped by religion.

"On one level, it's an incredible experience to be studying these religious figures in history, these great men, who materially changed the geography and the architecture and the physicality of the University and the city. And reading about how the narratives of British Protestant Christianity were constructed by Parker out of the texts and manuscripts in the Parker Library. It's like there is religion in the air here. I wasn't expecting it to be such a big part of my university experience but it very much has been."

Part of the reason for that is Lia's own Jewish faith and her involvement with the Jewish community in Cambridge. As President of JSOC, the Jewish students' society, Lia focused on creating an inclusive space for all members of the Society, celebrating the diversity of Jewish identity and religious beliefs.

Lia focussed on keeping lines of communication open between students, and meeting with other faith leaders who shared her approach to community building and social justice, something which has always been part of her life. One of the initiatives she is involved with is a project called the Universities of Sanctuary, which encourages institutions of higher education to become more explicitly accessible, especially to students of refugee backgrounds.

Stempenyu!

Lia and her close friend Anna Sanderson, who is studying at Sidney Sussex College, have been involved with theatre and music during their time in Cambridge and, says Lia, they wanted to do a final project together. "We wanted to co-direct something and we wanted it to be in some way culturally Jewish, that represents that culture in a joyful way." The result is the production Stempenyu!, which runs from 11-15 of March at the ADC Theatre.-

'Stempenyu was a real travelling Klezmer musician, who travelled around the shtetl of Eastern Europe playing at weddings and giving concerts. His charisma and beautiful playing made him internationally famous, and a notorious womaniser. Stempenyu is widely known via Marc Chagall’s paintings of violinists, which inspired the motif of the Fiddler on the Roof, but very few people know of his real origins.'

In 1888 the Yiddish novelist and playwright Sholem Aleichem wrote a novel based on the life of the musician, Stempenyu: A Jewish Romance, which was subsequently adapted into a play in 1913. Lia and Anna have now had the play translated by Alexander Kahn from Yiddish to English, and theirs will be the first English-language production of the play.

"One of the particularly exciting aspects of the production is that Anna is a descendant of Sholem Aleichem, and I am a great-great granddaughter of A Z Idelsohn, the Jewish ethnomusicologist who preserved many of the melodies and folk songs we are using in this production (and which would have been used by the early 20th-century productions, and likely by Stempenyu himself). So all of the themes of trans-generational transmission and representation are very pertinent in our own relationship to the text." 

As part of the production process, the co-directors organised workshops with a Yiddish performer to help guide them through Yiddish pronunciation and intonation, as well as the particularities of Yiddish audiences. The cast have practiced klezmer dancing, learning traditional dances such as Freylekhs and Horas. (You can see photos of these activities on the production's Instagram account.) They have also arranged for speakers to appear at the theatre on the opening and closing nights, as well as planning a Purim Party on Thursday 13 March at the ADC Bar.

Lia and Anna will be joined by  Dr Vanessa Paloma Elbaz and Tabitha Appel on Opening Night at 18.30 to discuss the process of using archived Klezmer and Ukrainian folk melodies to create the music of Stempenyu! 

On Closing Night, Saturday 15 March, also at 18.30 Alexander Kahn, the translator of Stempenyu! will be joined by historian and Yiddish pop singer Vivi Lachs, and cast member Elon Julius, to discuss the process of reviving Yiddish texts for contemporary audiences. Alexander Kahn is a Yiddishist and artist, currently studying as a painter. His translation of Stempenyu! is the first known English version of the play. Vivi Lachs is a historian of the Jewish East End of London and a composer and performer of Yiddish song. She sings and records with the bands Klezmer Klub and Katsha’nes, and co-hosts the Cockney Yiddish Podcast. Elon Julius plays Moyshe Menashe in Stempenyu!, and is a PhD student in Jewish American literature.

Tickets for Stempenyu! are still available on the ADC website.