That little jingle from the Patty Duke show dates me, but I found it irresistible after reading how researchers determined that Jews around the world are virtually cousins and genetically more like each other than they are like their non-Jewish neighbors. Jews thousands of miles apart share genetic markers commonly seen among distant relatives, such as fourth cousins.
The New York Times did not run the story, which is interesting, but the paper seemed to make oblique reference to the research today in a story about a Jewish men’s club on the Upper West Side of Manhattan that has been holding meetings for 70 years. Frank Levy, Robert Brustein, Bob Schwartz, Marty Brustein, and Dick Zimmern share “a lifelong affection for one another somehow inscribed in their DNA,” wrote reporter N.R. Kleinfeld.
So, Mark, I can hear some people saying, where’s the Saul Bellow angle to this post?
Easy, sweetheart. It’s in Bellow’s short story, “Cousins,” which is about the powerful ties of “Jewish cousinhood” and “Jewish consanguinity—a special phenomenon.”
Comments
Strange to read this heading as that damned sitcom song was in my head all last week – “Patty loves to rock and roll, a hot dog makes her lose control” – but still the importance of this genetic connection must remain. Maybe the goyim, in labeling us, contemptously or not, smart Jews, have the right idea. Nature or nurture? Sitcoms or the 6 o’clock news?
-Allen Lowe