Bociany

by Chava Rosenfarb, Chava Rosenfarb (Translator)

Overview

In Bociany, Rosenfarb offers completely absorbing portrayals of Jews and Christians from several walks of life in the shtetl. Her primary characters are the scribe's widow Hindele, her son Yacov, the chalk vendor Yossele Abedale, and his daughter Binele. Jewish relations with neighboring Catholics are generally civil, if complicated. Despite living next door to a convent, Hindele finds the nuns' behavior implacably alien. Rosenfarb establishes an indelible sense of place, evoking its charm and the shtetl residents' ease with the natural world. Her vivid characters and portrait of the preurban, pre-Holocaust world ring true. Yet even in isolated Bociany, new ideas-socialism, Zionism, Polish nationalism, secularism-begin to challenge the shtetl's traditional agrarian and mercantile economy.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780815611714
Publisher:	Syracuse University Press
Publication date:	10/15/2024
Series:	Library of Modern Jewish Literature
Pages:	440
Product dimensions:	6.00(w) x 9.00(h) x 1.20(d)

About the Author

Chava Rosenfarb was born in Lódz, Poland. She was a survivor of the Lódz Ghetto as well as the Auschwitz and Bergen-Belsen concentration camps. She was the recipient of numerous literary prizes. In 1979, she was awarded the Manger Prize-the highest award for Yiddish literature-for her trilogy Tree of Life (Der boim fun leib).

Editorial Reviews

In these two volumes, Rosenfarb--a survivor of the Lodz ghetto and winner of the Manger Prize for Yiddish literature--lovingly re-creates a forgotten world, the Polish shtetl or village of pre-World War II, with its Jewish and Gentile inhabitants, its poverty and longings, its travails and spirituality. In Bociany, which means "stork" in Polish (storks built their nests on the rooftops of the village), Hindele Polin, the scribe's wife, is a larger-than-life good soul trying to keep her family on the side of the living. She cannot, however, conquer consumption, to which her husband and eldest son succumb. Surprisingly, the book is not a sad one, discussing God, suffering, and how to be a mentsh (an honorable person) with grace and charm. Hindele; her son, Yacov; the chalk vender Yossele Abedale; and his daughter, Binele, are all shown to have a place in the village. But even in this isolated agrarian and mercantile setting, Zionism, socialism, Polish nationalism, and secularism are being made known. In Of Lodz and Love, the shtetl mentality gives way to that of the big city. Yacov and Binele make their way separately to the industrial city of Lodz during the first years of Polish independence. There, the would-be lovers learn firsthand about the upheavals that would herald a new Jewish national and political awakening. These two volumes present a superb panorama of Jewish transition from village life to the new challenges of the 20th century. Highly recommended.--Molly Abramowitz, Silver Spring, MD Copyright 2000 Cahners Business Information.\

Library Journal