“Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.
Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me,
I lift my lamp beside the golden door!”
The Statue of Liberty
These are the words said by the Statue of Liberty, the most recognizable symbol of the United States in the world, in the poem “The New Colossus” by Emma Lazarus, a New York poet (1849-1887).
The poem is not only a widely known phrase, but most importantly brings heart and soul to the Green Lady, welcoming the newcomers in New York, and often, in the United States.
Not only did I love the poem, whose first part goes:
Not like the brazen giant of Greek fame,
With conquering limbs astride from land to land;
Here at our sea-washed, sunset gates shall stand
A mighty woman with a torch, whose flame
Is the imprisoned lightning, and her name
Mother of Exiles. From her beacon-hand
Glows world-wide welcome; her mild eyes command
The air-bridged harbor that twin cities frame.
“Keep, ancient lands, your storied pomp!” cries she
with silent lips.
…but I also fell in love with the book “Emma’s Poem. The Voice of the Statue of Liberty” by Linda Glasser. The little and charming book, written in a simple, yet, informative and factual way, reveals the story of Lazarus. The book is filled up with wonderful, classy and elegant, paintings by Claire A. Nivola.
"Emma's Poem. The Voice of the Statue of Liberty" by Linda Glasser
Emma was a Jewish girl, brought up in a wealthy family and a wealthy neighborhood. She never lacked anything, nor did she witness poverty. Once, already grown-up writer, she made a trip to Ward’s Island in New York Harbor, where she saw hungry, poor and ragged Jewish immigrants from the Eastern Europe. Touched by their stories, Emma dared to help them and as a journalist, wrote about them – unusual things to do for women in 1880s. Thanks to her writing many New Yorkers started to care about the immigrants.
Then, Emma heard that money is being raised to build a pedestal for a statue, which is to be a gift of friendship from France to the United States. The statue is to show the love of liberty shared by both countries. Poets who contributed to the fundraiser were e.g. Mark Twain and Walt Whitman. Emma was asked to write a poem herself. All the money from the sale of books was devoted to build the pedestal.
Emma decided to express the thoughts of the Statue of Liberty, and emphasize what did she feel when welcoming the immigrants entering theNew World. Obviously, her experiences with the immigrants were the inspiration for the poem.
Despite its lyrical and fairy-tale character, the book gives the factual information about the statue, explaining its history and origin: it was erected in the New York Harbor, it is 151 feet tall, the arm holding the torch is 42 feet long, in it was packed in 1886 in 214 crates and shipped across the Atlantic Ocean from France, to be erected on a new pedestal.
“The New Colossus” was the only literary work read at the large celebration in 1883 to raise the money for the pedestal. Unfortunately, Emma did not live to see the statute erected. However, her poem outlived her. The poem is engraved on a plaque placed inside the entrance to the pedestal, it was printed in school textbooks and children around the country learned to recite it, last five lines of the poem were set to music by songwriter Irving Berlin and sung on Broadway.
Thanks to Emma’s poem the Statue of Liberty become the mother of immigrants, who was welcoming them with her torch.
Monika en route the Statue of Liberty
I love the Statue of Liberty. I love its peaceful smile, her dignity. She is the representation of what America is to those who immigrate to fulfill their American Dream: liberty, freedom, possibility, wealth, peace.
I remember myself. Every time I was landing at JFK, coming back from abroad, I was looking for her Green dignity. I saw her, and could peacefully land then. I was getting a confirmation, I came back home. And she is still here.
There is something in her presence that makes New York-New York, and America-America. She is like a queen, a guard, a mother of New York.
New York in Books 