From the Pages of Yedies Follow-up

by ROBERTA NEWMAN

On May 23, 2014, we posted an article from the December 1965 issue of Yedies about a visit to YIVO by nuns from Milwaukee who were writing a play based on the book I Never Saw Another Butterfly, an anthology of poems and drawings by children in the Terezin (Theresienstadt) Concentration Camp. We wondered if there was a connection to the well-known play that was first produced by the Milwaukee Playhouse in 1967, and so we reached out to its author, Celeste Raspanti.

Recently we heard back from Dr. Raspanti, now the Archivist of the Cathedral of Saint Paul at the National Shrine of the Apostle Paul in St. Paul, Minnesota. She confirmed that she was the nun who visited YIVO in 1965 (“there were never ‘nuns’”) and went on to say:

“I take pride in the fact that I was the first to call attention to the Terezin children with my play in 1967.  The play has had a long and wide history--from its premiere in Milwaukee to its performance in several translations in Europe--and thousands of performances in between those years. The play has changed my life […] The Terezin children have given me a legacy I cherish.”

Dr. Raspanti has also sent YIVO a copy of an article that appeared in The Milwaukee Journal in 1967 before the premiere of the play, as well as the texts of speeches about how she came to write the play and about her relationship with a survivor of Terezin who became a main character in I Never Saw Another Butterfly.