Customer Reviews

Beautiful as the Moon, Radiant as the Stars: Jewish Women in Yiddish Stories: An Anthology

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BEAUTIFUL AS THE MOON, RADIANT AS THE STARS: JEWISH WOMEN IN YIDDISH STORIES: AN ANTHOLOGY is a superb look at what it means to be a Jewish woman especially in a westernized society but also in places like Tsar Russia. Many of the stories were originally written in Yiddish and are transliterated into English so some of the idiomatic meaning may be lost, but the overall intent is captured and the prose smooth. The contributions were published in late 19th- and early 20th-century Europe, Russia, the United States and Israel with most found in 1920s and 1930s Yiddish newspapers and magazines.

Each of the short stories is well written and endearing as the topics remain strong today. Subjects like love for family, community and torah, and identity and assimilation remain powerful discussion topics even today. The commonalty besides being interesting is that all share (regardless of the authors' age, marital status, or social class) the belief that the Jewish female is key to the religion's survival. This is a superb anthology that though it provides a deep look into the early twentieth century Jewish life, the stories ring true for any person living in the information technology age.

Harriet Klausner

It is not possible in a short space to review all the stories. I have selected my three favorites; all are exqusitively written:

Kaddish by Dvora Baron

The word imagery and melancholy tone is superb and sets the stage for Rivele's profound feelings for her grandfather and for happenings that one suspects but would wish otherwise. "Outside- a disheveled, lumbering sky over a congealed, dead earth" was foreboding.

Rivele, a small slip of a girl, shows extraordinary courage to enter the study hall. She is mocked by a band of school boys and men block her way to the lectern casting her out. The description of the beseeching, lonesome, thoughtful pious eyes looking down on her from above the Holy Ark was poignant. I wondered if the writer intended for the reader to think that these eyes were not only those of her grandfather but also the eyes of the Almighty.

Spring by David Bergelsome

Polly Ratner was exactly twice the age of her sister Mura. She was a determined young woman, reclusive because of her demanding studies for her final examinations in the Faculty of Medicine. "Some kind of strange, invisible musical box was tinkling ceaselessly, day and night playing the last heartfelt melody of spring." Mura, at the impressionable age of fourteen, had become beguiled by an artist she had met while she and her school girl friends were viewing an exhibit of his work. Polly decides to intervene in order to find out what sort of man would send a love note to a child, one filled with passionate longing. The wording of the message awakens yearnings in Polly and she follows a predestined meeting with the artist.

Bella Fell In Love by Celia Dropkin

This is a complex story of a bored young woman leading a drab existence with a secret from her past that guides the narrative. As a child, she was lashed by her father when he lost his temper. The sharpness on her flesh "made her instantly holy, and purged her of her wrongdoings". There is an underlying sexuality in this reinforced by the reference to a fiery love for her father. When she falls in love with Stisson, she is re-enacting this act of pain mixed with pleasure. Her ardor is inflamed with each rejection as she shamelessly pursues him.