Description
he most famous play in the Yiddish repertoire, S. Ansky’s The Dybbuk has been made into two films and three operas and has been staged all over the world. As an extraordinary product of the Yiddish imagination, however, its literary and religious roots have never been thoroughly explored.
With a new translation of Ansky’s play that conveys its brilliant supernatural poetry, this anthology comprises thirty highly diverse literary masterpieces dating from the sixteenth to the twentieth century. Beginning with the first Yiddish tale about a possession (1602), these works influenced Ansky or formed a cultural and spiritual network that shows us how the era and tradition precipitated the drama. The result is a literary mosaic that shows a vast array of styles, from the earthy simplicity of homespun folk tales to the delicacy and elegance of polished literary expression.
Joachim Neugroschel brings together a wide variety of stories, verse narratives, and even modern melodrama—many never before translated into English.
About the Author
Joachim Neugroschel has translated some 180 books from French, German, Italian, Russian, and Yiddish, including works by Franz Kafka, Sholem Aleichem, Thomas Mann, Albert Schweitzer, and Hermann Hesse. He has won three PEN translation prizes as well as the translation prize of the French-American Foundation. In 1996, the French government made him a chevalier in the Order of Arts and Letters.
December 2000
