Becoming Rich

As is well-known, when Broadway songwriters Sheldon Harnick and Jerry Bock, and librettist Joseph Stein wrote Fiddler on the Roof, they based it on stories by Sholem Aleichem. Originally, they were given a novel written by Sholem Aleichem called Wandering Star, but they thought it was too unwieldly for a stage musical.  (I’ve read the book, and it’s very good, but it is indeed expansive and wouldn’t make a manageable musical.  The tale in large part is about a troupe of a family of actors in Russia, and their adventures which carry them to America, with a many-levelled love story.)  But Harnick said that they liked the environment so much that they looked into other stories by Sholem Aleichem, and came across his tales of Tevye’s daughters.  Which, of course, lead to Fiddler on the Roof.

Recently, I read a collection of short stories by Sholem Aleichem (the pen name of Sholom Rabinovitch), and there’s a section devoted solely to stories about Tevye.  A few things leaped out.

First, in one of the non-Tevye stories, there’s a sort of first-person tale where the author ruminates about what he’d do if was wealthy, and it’s titled, “If I Were Rothschild.”  I have to believe that that’s where Sheldon Harnick came up with the idea for “If I Were a Rich Man.”  The wishes are different – Tevye’s in the song are more about things for him and his family, the article is basically larger wishes for the town and wider environs, though the concept overlaps.  For instance, the short story begins, “If I were Rothschild, ah, if I were only Rothschild.”  And one thing he’d do is “provide a new roof for the old synagogue so the rain won’t drip on the heads of the men who come to pray.”  In fact, I think – and I can’t remotely swear to this, though I have a vague recollection – that I read years ago that that’s the original name of the song, but Harnick changed it.  And it’s a better title for the song, giving it a more universal and timeless sense.  But it seems very likely that this is where the idea of the song came from.  As I’ve written in the past, I became email friends with Sheldon Harnick, who passed away last year at age 99.  I’d have loved to have asked, had I read this story first.  But it really does seem near certain – most especially thanks to the second thing that leaped out.  Which is the real revelation here.

In the Tevye section of the collection I was reading, there’s a story called “The Bubble Bursts.”  Tevye has been convinced to make a risky investment with a very distant relative.  It doesn’t work out, the investment goes bust, and he loses it all.  But before it does, when left alone, all sorts of visions passed before him of what life will be like if he becomes rich – “visions so sweet,” he says “that I wished they would never end.”  And Tevye explains:

“I saw a large house with a tin roof right in the middle of town, and inside the house were big rooms and little rooms and pantries full of good things, and around it a yard full of chickens and ducks and geese.  I saw the mistress of the house walking around jingling her keys.  That was my wife, Golde, but what a different Golde from the one I knew.  This one had the face and manner of a rich man’s wife, with a double chin and a neck hung with pearls.  She strutted like a peacock giving herself an air, and yelling at the servants girls….And at the head of the table sat the master of the house, Tevye himself, in a robe and skullcap, and around him sat the foremost householders of the town, fawning on him.  “If you please, Reb Tevye.  Pardon me, Reb Tevye.”

Remarkable.  “If I Were a Rich Man” spills right out of that.

Unlike my guess with the “Rothschild” article's title, there is absolutely no question in mind that Sheldon Harnick read this particular story, and did a masterful job adapting some of Sholem Aleichman into a lyric.  All of which adds to the likelihood that he also read the story, "If I Were Rothschlld," given the overlap of it all.

For those of you who might not remember all the words of the song, here are just a few notable passages –

I'd build a big, tall house with rooms by the dozen
Right in the middle of the town
A fine tin roof with real wooden floors below.
 
I'd fill my yard with chicks and turkeys and geese and ducks
For the town to see and hear
Squawking just as noisily as they can.

I see my wife, my Goldie, looking like a rich man's wife
With a proper double-chin
Supervising meals to her heart's delight.
I see her putting on airs and strutting like a peacock
Oy, what a happy mood she's in
Screaming at the servants, day and night.
 
The most important men in town would come to fawn on me.
They would ask me to advise them like a Solomon the Wise:
‘If you please, Reb Tevye’
Pardon me, Reb Tevye’ --
Posing problems that would cross a rabbi's eyes.
 
No question at all.  The lyrics absolutely are adapted, in part, from Sholem Aleichem.  And wonderfully and artistically so.

​And so, just as a full reminder, here’s the song.
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And as a wonderful bonus, this is Sholem Aleichem himself (Sholom Rabinovitch, of course) reciting about a minute of that very story, "Ven ikh bin Rotshild."  Recorded over 100 years ago, I believe in 1902.
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