Moise, Penina

views updated

MOISE, Penina

Born 23 April 1797, Charleston, South Carolina; died 13 September 1880, Charleston, South Carolina Daughter of Abraham and Sarah Moise

Penina Moise was the sixth of nine children of parents who had fled to Charleston during the slave insurrections in Santo Domingo. The death of Moise's father forced her to abandon formal education and help support the family by needlework, but she nevertheless continued to study and write, publishing poems and stories in newspapers and periodicals. Devoutly religious, Moise served as superintendent of the religious school of Beth Elohim beginning in 1842. After the Civil War, although ill and nearly blind, Moise founded a school for girls and conducted literary salons.

Fancy's Sketch Book (1833) was probably the first published book to which a Jewish woman appended her full name. Primarily a volume of verse, it includes light satires, epigrams, lyrics, and occasional poems commemorating prominent events. Conventional themes of love, death, and nature predominate, but in many instances they are distinguished by charming poignancy, delicate wit, and clever word play. For example, in "The Disconcerted Concert" Moise uses the double meaning of musical terms to describe a quarrel among the instruments.

Serious themes are not neglected, and the book reveals a wide range of interests and knowledge, including Greek mythology, the Bible, Shakespeare, music, art, and history. Women are generally presented in terms of love or motherhood, but in one instance Moise writes movingly of the women who donated their wedding rings to support Kosciuszko's efforts to liberate Poland.

Hymns Written for the Use of Congregation Beth Elohim, first published in 1842 and enlarged in three subsequent editions, is primarily the work of Moise. The art of hymn writing, which requires decided meter with little variation, simple language that conveys an immediate sense of emotion, and above all sincere devoutness, brought out Moise's talents to the fullest—her hymns are still included in modern hymnals. In writing the lyrics, Moise often added images that echoed many parts of the service, and her dramatic images greatly enhance the effectiveness of the prayer.

Although the bulk of Moise's writings still lies buried in the numerous newspapers and periodicals to which she contributed, a selection of her poems and hymns was collected in Secular and Religious Works of Penina Moise (1911). Some of the verses from the earlier volumes were included, but the collection is notable for works on specifically Jewish subjects and a number of previously uncollected poems dealing with political and social issues. The refusal by the British House of Lords to grant constitutional rights to Jews became for Moise "that dark deformity from Freedom's code," and when the Jews of Damascus were being persecuted, she reproached the rest of the world that could "the suppliants scorn / From whose inspired relics revelation was born."

Limited by poverty, by social tradition, by illness, and by blindness, Moise nevertheless produced a substantial body of poems and hymns. Much of Moise's work reveals an excessive concern for the poetic diction and conventions of her time, but several of her satiric pieces can still delight readers. Moise's poems on serious subjects reveal an unusual awareness of social and moral problems. Her hymns, expressing a deep, sincere faith in God's mercy, continue to evoke a solemn piety. All contemporary accounts of Moise emphasize her cheerfulness, good humor, and wit, despite the hardships under which she lived. The mark of suffering which found no voice in her poetry was expressed only in the lines Moise wrote for her epitaph: "Lay no flowers on my grave. They are for those who live in the sun, and I have always lived in the shadow."

Bibliography:

Elzas, B. A., The Jews of South Carolina (1905). Moise, H., The Moise Family of South Carolina (1961). Reznikoff, C., and U. Z. Engleman, The Jews of Charleston (1950).