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<DIV>“Bennie -- as my cousin was always called -- lived alone in London, and he
had a standing invitation to our Sunday lunch; he was nearly always there. When
I was ten, he must have been about twenty-three or twenty-four. He was almost,
to look at, the comic Jew of the caricature, and he was that curious, but not
very uncommon, phenomenon, the silly Jew who seems deliberately to exaggerate
and exploit his silliness. He was the Jew so accurately described by one of the
Marx brothers: ‘He looks like a fool and talks like a fool, but don't let him
deceive you -- he is a fool.’ Sooner or later, usually towards the end of lunch,
Bennie would contrive to say something of inconceivable imbecility. My father
with an effort, would restrain himself and ignore Bennie. But Bennie was a
masochistic moth who could not keep away from the devastating flame. He would
turn with imbecile innocence to my father and ask him whether he did not agree
with the imbecility. My father's fingers would begin to beat a nervous tattoo
upon the tablecloth and all the little Woolfs fell silent round the table,
staring apprehensively at the insensate Bennie. ‘But, Uncle Sidney,’ he would
say, ‘Uncle Sidney, it is true, isn't it, that red-haired people in France are
not taxed?’ ‘No, it is not true, Bennie, and no one in the world but you
would believe it.’ ‘But, Uncle Sidney—‘ and then my father would throw up
his hands and let loose upon Bennie's head the torrent of his
exasperation.”</DIV>
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<DIV>“Sowing” (Hogarth Press, 1960), pp. 30-1.</DIV>
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<DIV>Who of us can honestly say we’ve come across a Jewish person with equally
stupid opinions?</DIV>
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<DIV>Stuart</DIV></DIV></DIV></BODY></HTML>