Isaac B. Singer: A Life

by Florence Noiville, Catherine Temerson (Translator)

Isaac Bashevis Singer (1904-1991) is widely recognized as the most popular Yiddish writer of the twentieth century. His translated body of work, for which he received the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1978, is beloved around the world. But although Singer was a very public and outgoing figure, much about his personal life remains unknown. In Isaac Bashevis Singer , Florence Noiville offers a glimpse into the world of this much-beloved but persistently elusive figure. An astonishingly prolific writer, Singer was able to recreate the lost world of Jewish Eastern Europe and also to describe the immigrant experience in America. Drawing heavily upon folklore, Singer’s work is noted for its mystical strain. But he was also heavily concerned with the problems of his own day, and through his novels and stories runs a strong undercurrent of social consciousness. Unafraid to celebrate peasant life, Singer was often accused of being vulgar, yet he was also recognized for a deeply moral sensibility. And much like his work, Singer’s personal life was marked by the son of a Rabbi, he struggled with warring currents of devotion and doubt. Solicitous of affection, he was also known for his philandering. Devoted to the notion of family, he abandoned his own son before the Second World War. Drawing on letters, personal recollections, and interviews with Singer’s friends, family, and publishing contemporaries, Florence Noiville speaks to these paradoxes. More appreciation than comprehensive biography, her narrative is rich in detail about the people, places, and ideas that shaped Singer’s world. A remarkably vivid portrait of the man and his work emerges—a compassionate, vivid, and insightful vision of one of the twentieth century’s greatest storytellers.

Genres: Biography, Jewish

208 pages, Hardcover

First published October 17, 2006

Reviews

[Bezimena knjizevna zadruga · Rating 3 out of 5]

Odveć hrabra, novinarka Monda i autorka knjige je znala da je Singer mrzeo biografije. Toliko dobro je to znala da je navedenom rečenicom otpočela svoju priču, računajući da bi veliki pisac ipak imao razumevanja za njen greh, a i ako ne bi, cenila je da bi je makar i kao sam nesumnjivo veliki grešnik, nekako prihvatio.
Nakon čitanja, kad sam malo bolje razumeo pisca kojeg nikad nisam čitao, jasno mi je da joj ne bi ni oprostio, ni razumeo. Bez obzira na to što je ovo divna knjiga. Singer je prosto bio takav. Težak kao Trepča.

I ja mrzim biografije, manje iz razloga što je važno delo a ne autor, više zbog toga što samo autobiografije imaju smisla. Samo one mogu da pulsiraju autentično, i kad lažu i kad plaču, i kad veličaju i kad kinje, i koliko god da pate od manjka objektivnosti, samo takve i imaju vrednost, makar za prave čitaoce, mislim.

No, Florans Noavil je napisala knjigu uspevši da obuzda svoju novinarsku potrebu da traga za istinom, koje ionako nema, i dozvoljavajući sebi povremena potonuća u emotivni život Isakov, citirajući ga s merom, dajući reč njegovim saputnicima, pričajući usputno veoma lepe epizode o varšavskim ulicama, u jevrejskim podelama, o paklu drugog rata, o izanobelovskim kulisama, stvarajući neku vrstu miniromana umesto klasične biografske storije.

Pakao je pisati o čoveku s dva lica, o hladnom antiporodičnom beskrupuloznom, egomanijačkom mrgudu i šmekerskom, vrckavom, toplom i krhkom mladiću, istovremeno, pravu pakao.
Rezultat je ipak više rajski.

[J.A. · Rating 3 out of 5]

Isaac Bashevis Singer had so many identities it is difficult to contain all of them in a single biography. A Pole who emigrated to America, he is all but dismissed in his homeland. Descended from seven generations of rabbis, he embraced a secular lifestyle. A champion of the Yiddish language, he was rejected by the traditional Yiddish community. Singer wrote his stories in Yiddish then rewrote them in English, creating two distinct works rather than a set of translations. It would seem appropriate to write his biography in two volumes in order to capture the duality of his nature. This book is a single volume, and a slender one at that, but there is a disjointed feeling to it. That may be attributed to Noiville or Catherine Temerson, who translated the book from French, or it may be the paradoxical legacy of Singer himself. This is not a concise analysis of Singer's life and writing; readers interested in such critical writing should read Jonathan Rosen's article in the June 7, 2004 issue of The New Yorker instead. This is a book for the reader who is interested in another perspective on an author so unique that no comprehensive interpretation of his life can be written by mortal hands!

[Dick Nepon · Rating 4 out of 5]

A great deal about what made Singer who he was.