Profs and Pints Alameda presents: “A Monster Made by Human Hands,” on the origins and evolution of Judaism’s golem, with Michael M. Chemers, director of the Center for Monster Studies and professor and chair of the Department of Performance, Play, and Design at the University of California, Santa Cruz.
As Halloween approaches it’s worth considering that Dr. Frankenstein’s monster was hardly the first and only one that a human brought to life. Long before Mary Shelley wrote her terrifying tale of scientific hubris, the golem, a complex figure sculpted from mud or clay, stomped throughout Jewish folklore.
Come to the debut of Profs and Pints at Alameda, California’s Faction Brewing for a fascinating scholarly discussion of the golem, its purpose, and its relation to other monsters out there.
Bringing this figure to life in your minds will be Professor Michael Chemers, a theatre historian and expert researcher of monsters.
In a talk that you’ll come to view as an early Halloween treat, he’ll present a "monstrogenealogy" of the golem, discussing how it originated and has changed over centuries. You’ll learn how the golem has evolved from its origins as a mindless automaton that refused to work on the Sabbath, to a Frankenstein-esque peril for the magicians who create it and the communities that harbor it, to a symbol of modern-day suspicion of advanced technology and its complicated consequences.
All along the way Dr. Chemers will discuss stories, plays, and films that feature golems and how they engage in a discussion, steeped in Jewish ethical traditions, that explores the perils of ethical behavior when one's enemies are irrational and full of hatred.
You’ll learn about important manifestations of the golem in two plays of the 1920s: Carel Kapek’s RUR and Leivick Halper’s The Golem. Both plays, heavily influenced by Mary Shelley's Frankenstein, set the stage for a startling transformation of the golem into a monster representing unleashed technology and the exercise of power without compassion.
Dr. Chemers will discuss how today the golem appears in our modern literature and films of science fiction in a variety of surprising ways. While they may seem to bear little resemblance to the original lumbering clay monster, they continue to engage in very ancient discussions about subjectivity, compassion, and mercy. You’ll learn how the work of monster scholars is underpinned by a desire to show how the monster is used in culture to bear witness to atrocity and social injustice and to envision empathetic forms of resistance and a more just future. (Advance tickets: $13.50 plus processing fee. Door: $17, or $15 with student I.D. Listed time is for doors. Talk starts 30 minutes later.)
Image: Golem figurines on display in a shop in Prague in the Czech Republic. (Photo by Enrico / Creative Commons.)