Vocal Borderlines: A Study of a Lamentation Recording from Habima’s Performance of The Eternal Jew

Abstract

This chapter examines a vocal representation of a borderline from an audio recording of Hanna Rovina in Habima’s 1923 production of The Eternal Jew .1 Analyzing Rovina’s recording of the lamentation of the Messiah’s mother, I discuss how aural manifestations articulate cultural distinctions. Gershom Scholem expressed the idea of language emission as a liminal repository in his 1917 essay “On Lament and Lamentation” (“Über Klage und Klaglied”), in which he defines the language of the border: ( verschweigt ) its entire is based on a revolution of silence. It is not but only points toward the symbol; it is not concrete ( gegenständlich ), but annihilates the object. This lament.2