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The Best of Sholem Aleichem
The Best of Sholom Sholem Aleichem, Irving Howe, Ruth R. The Best of Sholom New Republic FIRST First Edition, First Printing. Not price-clipped. Published by New Republic Books, 1979. Octavo. Hardcover. Book is very good. Dust jacket is very good with shelf/edgewear. Great copy of this collection of short stories. 100% positive feedback. 30 day money back guarantee. NEXT DAY SHIPPING! Excellent customer service. Please email with any questions. All books packed carefully and ship with free delivery confirmation/tracking. All books come with free bookmarks. Ships from Sag Harbor, New York.Seller 343867 Short Stories We Buy Books! Collections - Libraries - Estates - Individual Titles. Message us if you have books to sell!
276 pages, Hardcover
First published January 31, 1980
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Displaying 1 - 13 of 13 reviews
June 3, 2020
Sholem Aleichem's great stories are culturally nuanced, yet the translation to English of some remove many of these nuances since the English-speaking audience cannot possibly understand them in context.
One such glaring translation--by no fault of the translator as by the cultural context--are Tevye's stories. The character, a lay philosopher with only a rudimentary knowledge of the Bible and Talmud, misquotes lines and misinterpret scenes in hilarious ways, but which the translator had to drop.
One such glaring translation--by no fault of the translator as by the cultural context--are Tevye's stories. The character, a lay philosopher with only a rudimentary knowledge of the Bible and Talmud, misquotes lines and misinterpret scenes in hilarious ways, but which the translator had to drop.
December 17, 2011
I think that this collection was a fantastically written view into Pre-20th century Jewish writing. I picked this up as a study into the lives of the characters in Fiddler On The Roof, a play I was auditioning for and eventually cast in. I really enjoyed the stark folkloric nature of these stories, not to mention the fact that the narratives bounce between fiction and nonfiction quite easily. One easily can get lost in the truthfulness and believability of the entire story - they are genuine, heartfelt, and meaningful no matter the culture you come from. The themes of difficulty of family, the hardship of poverty and struggles within communities, and the nature of god and existence all make an important appearance - and not to sound so serious, Aleichem approaches these themes with wit and humor. The stories exist almost as if you are hearing them at the table from an elderly relative after eating a great big meal. They are beautiful and real, and the narrative itself is so original, it is no surprise that after reading this collection I can see the influence in books by J.S. Foer, M. Chabon, Dave Eggers, and other favorites almost immediately. Regardless, as a character study, and seeing into the soul and community of my character I will be playing, this book is invaluable. To look into the lives of the Jewish Community during this time period in history is enlightening and undoubtedly accurate. To experience the love, and community, and humor in his characters, this book is wonderful. I would suggest this to anyone, really; it is a testament to community and humanity in all of its glory, and is a very funny and touching book.
May 11, 2017
This book caught my interest because I had read in Tradition!: The Highly Improbable, Ultimately Triumphant Broadway-to-Hollywood Story of Fiddler on the Roof, the World's Most Beloved Musical that one of my favorite musicals of all time, Fiddler on the Roof, was based on stories by this author. This is a collection of short stories, divided into four sections, and is translated from the original Yiddish.
The editors point out in the introduction that in some stories, some of the humor is unfortunately lost in translation, especially where quotes from Hebrew are concerned. So there were a few stories that, when they ended, I felt like scratching my head and wondering if I'd missed something. But, that sometimes happens with English stories too, so maybe it's me.
Either way, the majority of these stories do not involve actual characters from Fiddler. Section one, the largest, was probably my least favorite, though I still enjoyed parts of it.
Section two introduces Tevye the milk man. I see there are story collections devoted to him and his daughters, so I can only assume this is just a sampling here. It was very interesting to read--in some places I think this Tevye has more of an "edge" to him than the Tevye in the musical. But the final story in this section, "Get Thee Out" portrays so well the emotions and agony of being chased out of the only home you've known.
I enjoyed the third section--the characters were amusingly eccentric, but not so much so that I felt like I couldn't understand them.
The fourth section gets a bit darker, as the reality of pogroms hits home. It is interesting to trace the tone of this collection from the beginning to the end, which apparently mirrored Aleichem's life as well, as he had to flee his home in the early 1900s.
Overall, I think the best thing about this collection is how well it portrays the "voice" of Jewish culture and tradition at this time and place. Even when the characters were not from Fiddler, I could still see common themes and pieces of those characters in others.
And now I really want to watch Fiddler on the Roof again.
The editors point out in the introduction that in some stories, some of the humor is unfortunately lost in translation, especially where quotes from Hebrew are concerned. So there were a few stories that, when they ended, I felt like scratching my head and wondering if I'd missed something. But, that sometimes happens with English stories too, so maybe it's me.
Either way, the majority of these stories do not involve actual characters from Fiddler. Section one, the largest, was probably my least favorite, though I still enjoyed parts of it.
Section two introduces Tevye the milk man. I see there are story collections devoted to him and his daughters, so I can only assume this is just a sampling here. It was very interesting to read--in some places I think this Tevye has more of an "edge" to him than the Tevye in the musical. But the final story in this section, "Get Thee Out" portrays so well the emotions and agony of being chased out of the only home you've known.
I enjoyed the third section--the characters were amusingly eccentric, but not so much so that I felt like I couldn't understand them.
The fourth section gets a bit darker, as the reality of pogroms hits home. It is interesting to trace the tone of this collection from the beginning to the end, which apparently mirrored Aleichem's life as well, as he had to flee his home in the early 1900s.
Overall, I think the best thing about this collection is how well it portrays the "voice" of Jewish culture and tradition at this time and place. Even when the characters were not from Fiddler, I could still see common themes and pieces of those characters in others.
And now I really want to watch Fiddler on the Roof again.
February 28, 2011
This collection of short fiction pieces was my bedtime reading for several nights. Most of the stories are humorous, with an undercurrent of tragedy, and very readable, and I enjoyed reading this book very much.
Sholom Aleichem was the pen name of Ukrainian-born Jewish author Solomon Rabinovich (1859 – 1916). He wrote in Yiddish, adopting his pen name from the common Yiddish greeting shalom aleichem, meaning “peace be with you”. By 1890 he had become a central figure in Yiddish literature, becoming known as the “Jewish Mark Twain”.
His stories deal with episodes in the lives of Jews in Eastern Europe and Russia; Jews living mostly in poverty, and in a distinct aura of anti-semitism from their Gentile neighbors. But for the most part, the stories are humorous, as the people live as best they can. Among the stories in this collection are several about Tevye the dairyman; the stories about Tevye were adapted into the musical Fiddler on the Roof (1964), the first commercially successful English-language stage production about Jewish life in Eastern Europe.
I loved these stories, and I found this collection to be great bedtime reading, and without reservation I recommend this book.
Sholom Aleichem was the pen name of Ukrainian-born Jewish author Solomon Rabinovich (1859 – 1916). He wrote in Yiddish, adopting his pen name from the common Yiddish greeting shalom aleichem, meaning “peace be with you”. By 1890 he had become a central figure in Yiddish literature, becoming known as the “Jewish Mark Twain”.
His stories deal with episodes in the lives of Jews in Eastern Europe and Russia; Jews living mostly in poverty, and in a distinct aura of anti-semitism from their Gentile neighbors. But for the most part, the stories are humorous, as the people live as best they can. Among the stories in this collection are several about Tevye the dairyman; the stories about Tevye were adapted into the musical Fiddler on the Roof (1964), the first commercially successful English-language stage production about Jewish life in Eastern Europe.
I loved these stories, and I found this collection to be great bedtime reading, and without reservation I recommend this book.
December 23, 2022
The Introduction is practically useless and the Glossary of terms at the end is incomplete and inadequate, but fortunately none of that detracts from what is an amazing collection of stories by one of the greatest humorists of all time. A truly wonderful collection of stories highly recommended to all by this reader.
April 4, 2015
This anthology was pure reading pleasure. To anyone who, like me, has heard of Sholom Aleichem, and is probably familiar with his character Tevye the Dairyman from the successful 'Fiddler on the Roof' musical play/film - an adaptation of some of the 'Tevye's Daughters' stories, but who has not previously read his work; if you enjoyed that character - and want a bit more - then as far as I can tell you're in for a treat with much of what he wrote. 'The Best of' includes twenty-two stories from his work - many of which are newly translated here with previously omitted material, as well as three appearing in English for the first time.
These hugely enjoyable stories while on the one hand entertaining, are on the other also a moving illumination of a culture now vanished of course, that of the shtetl - the small Jewish semi-rural communities of eastern Europe that were scattered like salt and pepper throughout the Russian Empire's 'Pale of Settlement' and the fringes of the Austro-Hungarian Empire. That small planet of a Yiddish speaking people, the 'old country', their villages and inns, their prayer-houses and bath-houses, the chicken yards, tailors' workshops and market places where they worked, as we know had pretty much all gone by the mid-20th century - ending predominantly in either mass emigration or mass extermination. Reading these stories will momentarily recreate that lost world.
As the editors suggest in their epistolary introduction (which I found extremely worthwhile reading having finished the stories first) - If you follow the line of the plot, [referring to the Tevye stories] it traces nothing less than the breakup of an entire culture. ... Tevye, who is actually defenceless against the barrage of challenges and attacks that lay him low, should have been a tragic victim. Instead, balancing his losses on the sharp edge of his tongue, he maintains the precarious posture of a comic hero."
Sholom Aleichem - the pen name of Solomon Nahumovitch Rabinovitch (1859-1916)- was a master humourist. A master of character, of setting, of timing, of leaving you wanting more - everything you would want from a great teller of tales. This collection - clearly a labour of love for the academic editors - is not just a selection of the Tevye stories - not that I'd be complaining - but effectively is a retrospective representation of his different story themes and many memorable characters that he created. There's Shimon-Eli a haunted tailor, Mottel the cantor's son, Benjamin Lastetchke ("the richest man in Kasrilevke. There is no end to his greatness!") and the Krushniker delegation to name a few. The fictional shtetl of Kasrilveke itself is perhaps his greatest creation of all. He takes you there with just a few strokes of his pen. The honest hard-working mensch, the idle beggar, the gossip, the unfortunate entrepreneur, the fool, the con-artist, the sage, the spirit of beloved grandparents long gone - they're all here.
But don't read Sholom Aleichem if a little chauvinism here and there offends. Tevye the milkman has a wonderfully mischievous line in matrimonial put-downs:
'"What do you say?" I ask my wife. "What do you think of his proposition?"
"What do you want me to say?" she asks. "I know that Mencachem-Mendel isn't a nobody who would want to swindle you. He doesn't come from a family of nobodies. He has a very respectable father, and as for his grandfather, he was a real jewel. All of his life, even after he became blind, he studied the Torah. And Grandmother Tzeitl, may she rest in peace, was no ordinary woman either."
"A fitting parable." I said. "It's like bringing Chanukah candles to a Purim feast. We talk about investments and she drags in her Grandmother Tzeitl who used to bake honeycake, and her grandfather who died of drink. That's a woman for you. No wonder King Solomon traveled the world over and didn't find a female with an ounce of brains in her head."'
One of the stories translated here for the first time - 'The Krushniker Delegation' - highlighted a different aspect of his work that particularly interested the history buff in me. The editors write that being written toward the end of his life, it deals with the experiences of east European Jews caught in the First World War between Germans and Poles. Elements of the traditional Sholom Aleichem are still there, but the tone and substance have changed - "...as if the great humourist is giving way before the blows of modern history." There is a dark edge to his writing that surfaces and has a knack of almost catching the reader off-guard.
From the story 'Once There Were Four' - a frame tale (with the author as one of the eponymous characters along with three of the greatest Jewish writers of the age) in which four "anecdotes" on the subject of forgetting reveal how even those great writers are revealed as ordinary, anxious Jews, faltering and trembling in ordinary, if not humiliating circumstances:
"There are moments you want to forget, to blot out from memory - but it is impossible. We forget what should be remembered and remember what should be forgotten. That, in a nutshell, is the moral of the story. Now it's someone else's turn."
These hugely enjoyable stories while on the one hand entertaining, are on the other also a moving illumination of a culture now vanished of course, that of the shtetl - the small Jewish semi-rural communities of eastern Europe that were scattered like salt and pepper throughout the Russian Empire's 'Pale of Settlement' and the fringes of the Austro-Hungarian Empire. That small planet of a Yiddish speaking people, the 'old country', their villages and inns, their prayer-houses and bath-houses, the chicken yards, tailors' workshops and market places where they worked, as we know had pretty much all gone by the mid-20th century - ending predominantly in either mass emigration or mass extermination. Reading these stories will momentarily recreate that lost world.
As the editors suggest in their epistolary introduction (which I found extremely worthwhile reading having finished the stories first) - If you follow the line of the plot, [referring to the Tevye stories] it traces nothing less than the breakup of an entire culture. ... Tevye, who is actually defenceless against the barrage of challenges and attacks that lay him low, should have been a tragic victim. Instead, balancing his losses on the sharp edge of his tongue, he maintains the precarious posture of a comic hero."
Sholom Aleichem - the pen name of Solomon Nahumovitch Rabinovitch (1859-1916)- was a master humourist. A master of character, of setting, of timing, of leaving you wanting more - everything you would want from a great teller of tales. This collection - clearly a labour of love for the academic editors - is not just a selection of the Tevye stories - not that I'd be complaining - but effectively is a retrospective representation of his different story themes and many memorable characters that he created. There's Shimon-Eli a haunted tailor, Mottel the cantor's son, Benjamin Lastetchke ("the richest man in Kasrilevke. There is no end to his greatness!") and the Krushniker delegation to name a few. The fictional shtetl of Kasrilveke itself is perhaps his greatest creation of all. He takes you there with just a few strokes of his pen. The honest hard-working mensch, the idle beggar, the gossip, the unfortunate entrepreneur, the fool, the con-artist, the sage, the spirit of beloved grandparents long gone - they're all here.
But don't read Sholom Aleichem if a little chauvinism here and there offends. Tevye the milkman has a wonderfully mischievous line in matrimonial put-downs:
'"What do you say?" I ask my wife. "What do you think of his proposition?"
"What do you want me to say?" she asks. "I know that Mencachem-Mendel isn't a nobody who would want to swindle you. He doesn't come from a family of nobodies. He has a very respectable father, and as for his grandfather, he was a real jewel. All of his life, even after he became blind, he studied the Torah. And Grandmother Tzeitl, may she rest in peace, was no ordinary woman either."
"A fitting parable." I said. "It's like bringing Chanukah candles to a Purim feast. We talk about investments and she drags in her Grandmother Tzeitl who used to bake honeycake, and her grandfather who died of drink. That's a woman for you. No wonder King Solomon traveled the world over and didn't find a female with an ounce of brains in her head."'
One of the stories translated here for the first time - 'The Krushniker Delegation' - highlighted a different aspect of his work that particularly interested the history buff in me. The editors write that being written toward the end of his life, it deals with the experiences of east European Jews caught in the First World War between Germans and Poles. Elements of the traditional Sholom Aleichem are still there, but the tone and substance have changed - "...as if the great humourist is giving way before the blows of modern history." There is a dark edge to his writing that surfaces and has a knack of almost catching the reader off-guard.
From the story 'Once There Were Four' - a frame tale (with the author as one of the eponymous characters along with three of the greatest Jewish writers of the age) in which four "anecdotes" on the subject of forgetting reveal how even those great writers are revealed as ordinary, anxious Jews, faltering and trembling in ordinary, if not humiliating circumstances:
"There are moments you want to forget, to blot out from memory - but it is impossible. We forget what should be remembered and remember what should be forgotten. That, in a nutshell, is the moral of the story. Now it's someone else's turn."
January 5, 2024
Great stories from the shtetls.
July 19, 2013
Проклятый этот курсеровский курс отравляет мне июль, потому что я постоянно читаю что-то про Холокост, слушаю что-то про Холокост, смотрю что-то про Холокост, и вот эта книжка - это все от усердия, потому что я прочла On Account of a hat и не поняла, зачем, про что, как это мне поможет. В сборнике все выглядит, впрочем, куда лучше, монолитно и скрепленно.
Сразу вспоминается, как я купила девочкам (ну ладно, себе - девочки такой восхитительный повод) "Рассказы для детей" Исаака Башевиса Зингера и подверглась гонениям со стороны мамы, которая мне сказала: "И кого ты из них хочешь вырастить?" А мне очень нравятся эти рассказы в частности и литература на идише в общем - потому что а)не забывать; б)выходить за пределы своего уютного мещанского мирка. И еще - раз уж я болтаю, а не пишу внятную рецензию: на уровне баек помню историю, как немец назвал своих дочерей Мирра и Рахиль (ручаюсь за Рахиль на 146%), чтобы они никогда не хотели повторить опыт гитлеровской Германии.
Сразу вспоминается, как я купила девочкам (ну ладно, себе - девочки такой восхитительный повод) "Рассказы для детей" Исаака Башевиса Зингера и подверглась гонениям со стороны мамы, которая мне сказала: "И кого ты из них хочешь вырастить?" А мне очень нравятся эти рассказы в частности и литература на идише в общем - потому что а)не забывать; б)выходить за пределы своего уютного мещанского мирка. И еще - раз уж я болтаю, а не пишу внятную рецензию: на уровне баек помню историю, как немец назвал своих дочерей Мирра и Рахиль (ручаюсь за Рахиль на 146%), чтобы они никогда не хотели повторить опыт гитлеровской Германии.
March 31, 2008
what fun these are!
August 11, 2010
Excellent so far. I stopped reading once the book got to the Tevya stories, I left a bookmark in the volume.
June 21, 2011
Funny, enlightening, well written.
August 7, 2015
Great collection of authentically Jewish short stories with wry humor. Not a book you'll blow through, but worth the read just for all the great expressions.
July 7, 2017
there is no one better at doing what he does.
Displaying 1 - 13 of 13 reviews