Isaac Bashevis Singer

In 1648, when the Cossack leader Bogdan Chmielnitski led an uprising against the aristocratic leaders of Poland, hundreds of thousands of Jews, caught between the rival armies, were slaughtered or enslaved. For Jacob, a Jew, and Wanda, a Christian, to fall in love in the wake of "The Great Catastrophe" was unthinkable to both their communities.

These are wonderful [Yiddish] stories with vivid characterizations, lush imagery, and plots rich with emotion and imagination. My favorite is Passions: a meditation on how man becomes obsessed with something--to the extent of transforming one's life--anything can become a passion. --David Oberlander at Amazon.com.

"This volume collects eighteen essays by Isaac Bashevis Singer (1902-1991), who was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1978. A prolific author of fiction, memoir, and criticism, Singer wrote primarily in Yiddish, but he translated several dozen of his essays into English to present as lectures at colleges and synagogues throughout his life, especially during the 1960s. Despite his plans to collect and publish these essays before his death, they...

As each animal boasts of the qualities he feels make him especially worthy to go on Noah's ark, Noah takes a particular liking to the dove.

A collection of short stories which explores the humor and life of the people of Poland.

"Isaac Bashevis Singer's 'Gimpl tam' was published in Yiddish in 1945, about a month before Nazi Surrender. A story of bullying and the potential for revenge, is the deathbed confession of an orphaned baker who is targeted by his community for ridicule and practical jokes. Gimpl has come to be seen as a symbol of the Jewish people in the diaspora, and minorities in general. Should they be passive in the face of aggression? Or should they defend themselves?...