Product Description

Runner-up in the 2005 National Jewish Book Award in the Anthologies and Collections category.

A comprehensive collection of best short fiction by the three classic Yiddish authors.

Two early works by S.Y. Abramovitsh introduce the reader to Abramovitsh's alter ego Mendele the Book Peddler. Mendele narrates both The Little Man and Fishke the Lame. In different voices, he also presents a diverse cast of characters including Isaac Abraham as tailor's apprentice, choirboy, and corrupt businessman. Reb Alter tells of his matchmaking mishap and Fishke relates his travels through the Ukraine with a caravan of beggars.

Sholem Aleichem's Tevye reemerges from new translations of "Hodel" and "Chava" in all of his comic splendor. Notes enable students to follow Tevye's uneven steps through Bible quotations. Four of Sholem Aleichem's other eloquent monologists come back to haunt us in scintillating translations.

The selections from Peretz include his finest stories about the hasidim, such as "Kabbalists," "Teachings of the Hasidim," and the ironic tale "The Rebbe's Pipe." A fresh rendering of Peretz's masterpiece "Between Two Mountains" represents the meeting of an inspirational rebbe and an awe-inspiring rabbi.

Following the translations are three biographical essays about these giants of modern Yiddish literature.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #583798 in Books
• Published on: 2004-04
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Hardcover
• 256 pages

Review
...Ken Frieden has produced yet another: a collection of fresh translations of the great troika of Yiddish storytellers ... -- The Jerusalem Report

...a young writer filled with the critical sensibility and reformist urges of the Jewish Enlightenment, and fleshes out ... -- Literary Quarterly

This is a book for every collection — university, synagogue, yeshiva, and public library — and is highly recommended ... -- AJL Newsletter

About the Author
Ken Frieden is the B. G. Rudolph Professor and Director of the Judaic Studies Program at Syracuse University.

Professor Frieden has published numerous books and essays on Yiddish and Hebrew literature. His acclaimed study Classic Yiddish Fiction is the companion volume to the anthology Classic Yiddish Stories.

Frieden received his doctorate in comparative literature at Yale University.. He has taught at Syracuse University and Emory University and has been a visiting professor at Tel Aviv University, Haifa University, Heidelberg University, and the University of California Davis. He has also received major fellowships for research at Harvard University, Oxford University, the Free University of Berlin, and the Hebrew University in Jerusalem. Frieden's previous work as an editor resulted in the anthologies Tales of Mendele the Book Peddler and Sholem Aleichem's Nineteen to the Dozen: Monologues and Bits and Bobs of Other Things. He edits the Syracuse University Press series, Judaic Traditions in Literature, Music, and Art.

Customer Reviews

Turn-of-the-century Life: E. European Culture and Humor
Discovered this volume of translated Yiddish stories quite by chance or more likely by "serendipity" as Dr. Carl Gustav Jung would say. My reading interests lean toward understanding different cultures, religious beliefs and customs. This book covers all these topics This book contains the writing of three famous authors, S.Y. Abramovitsh, called "the grandfather of modern Yiddish literature", Sholem Aleichem, considered "grandson" to the master who adds a comedic twist to his stories, and I.L. Peretz who according to the introduction founded modern Yiddish modernism. I knew I was in for a delicious treat as I read the first page of the first story ...

"The Little Man: or Portait of a Life" begins with Mendele the Book Peddler introducing himself and his trade ... how as he travels from place to place he learns about human behavior as he indulges his curiousity in observing and commenting about people. The reader is tickled by the translation as Mendele shares his deep insights about human nature, with a wonderful Yiddish accent. He sums up part of his philosophy as follows, "Believe me, all the world is a marketplace. Everyone wants the other guy to lose so he could gain. Everyone is looking for bargains. ... Rich people always seem a little lost and worried. If you've got money, what's to worry about? Seems to me that you don't need any fancy ideas about money. But I am getting off the point". [p.5] Needless to say, it is a highly educational experience to learn how Mendele concludes what characteristics describe "the little man". Indeed, his views apply to modern man in the 21st century!!

The second story, "Fishke, the Lame: A Story of Poor Jewish Folks" is another brilliantly written story . The reader is provided a description of an afternoon on the 17th of Tammuz in the heat of the summer ... you can just see the flies buzzing and feel the humidity and sweltering heat, no breeze, no relief of a rain shower in sight. At the foot of the Green Mountain, children are dancing and singing, as people greet the Reb, his only response is "Bah!" In this unique story, the reader is introduced to the concept, even the lame and crippled are G-d's children and, as such, entitled to some happiness and earthly pleasures. We are provided glimpses of life lived in the late 1860s. At the time, Fishke, the Lame was matched to marry "the blind orphan girl". Fishke had often been over-looked in the past from this time-honored tradition of matching up cripples, scoundrels, and beggars with unmarried girls. This usually occured during epidemics and conscriptions, in hopes of ending the events in question. Unexpectedly, this story provides greater insight into the behavior of one of the more prominent upright citizens of the community rather than the lame and crippled.

Sholem Aleichem's story "Hodel" provides a marvellous description of how one of the dairy farmer's beautiful daughters gets married to a student, whose subject of study is secretive. Hodel suddenly gets an interest in reading books and grammar after the student becomes a guest boarder in the Tevye's home ... The conversations and colloquial speech are rendered so effectively this story is a pleasure to read. All the stories are superbly written! This book provides the modern reader an outstanding cast of colorful and memorable characters who live an almost mythical existence during one the most unique times in history. Receives my highest recommendations. Erika Borsos (erikab93)

Ably and collaboratively translated into English
Compiled and edited by Ken Frieden (B. G. Rudolph Chair in Judaic Studies at Syracuse University) Classic Yiddish Stories Of S. Y. Abramovitsch, Sholem Aleichem, And I. L. Peretz is a collection of the best short works by three influential nineteenth-century Jewish authors. Opening with Abramovitsch's novellas "The Little Man" and "Fishke the Lame", Classic Yiddish Stories goes on to present Aleichem's classic tales of the gregarious Tevye who struggled to raise strong-willed daughters, to Peretz's neo-hasidic tales immersed in hasidic traditions. An enduring anthology of classical works that reflect Yiddish daily life and culture with breathtaking clarity and pathos, Classic Yiddish Stories is ably and collaboratively translated into English by Ken Frieden, Tod Gorelick, and Michael Wex.