Tevye the Dairyman and Motl the Cantor's Son (Penguin Classics) [Paperback]

Sholem Aleichem (Author), Aliza Shevrin (Translator), Dan Miron (Introduction)

Book Description

Publication Date: January 27, 2009 | Series: Penguin Classics

For the 150th anniversary of the birth of the "Jewish Mark Twain,"a new translation of his most famous works

Tevye the Dairyman and Motl the Cantor's Son are the most celebrated characters in all of Jewish fiction. Tevye is the lovable, Bible-quoting father of seven daughters, a modern Job whose wisdom, humor, and resilience inspired the lead character in Fiddler on the Roof. And Motl is the spirited and mischievous nine-year-old boy who accompanies his family on a journey from their Russian shtetl to New York, and whose comical, poignant, and clear-eyed observations capture with remarkable insight the struggles and hopes and triumphs of Jewish immigrants to America at the turn of the twentieth century.

Editorial Reviews

From Booklist

With all the talk today about the survival of Yiddish, there continues to be a big demand for the work of beloved Jewish writer Sholem Aleichem. Fortunately, some of Aleichem’s best work was newly translated last year to celebrate the writer’s one-hundred-fiftieth birthday in February 2009. Tevye, the Dairyman and Motl, the Cantor’s Son brings together not only “Tevye,” the story on which the famous Broadway musical Fiddler on the Roof is based, but also two other novels that combine the shtetl story with the immigration drama of leaving home and coming to America. Dan Miron’s brilliant introduction to this book will bring in new readers and also make Fiddler fans revisit the stories they thought they knew. And you have to read them aloud: the torrents of earthy curses (“May you grow like an onion with your head in the ground!”) and the mushy endearments; the kvetching and the grandiose lies; the competition for who is more miserable. Aleichem remains the great humanist, the most popular Yiddish writer ever; he’s often and appropriately called the Jewish Mark Twain. --Hazel Rochman

About the Author

Sholem Aleichem is the pen name of Sholem Rabinovitch (1859-1916), the most beloved writer in Yiddish literature. Born in Russia, he fled the pogroms with his family and immigrated to New York in 1905. His funeral procession was witnessed by 100,000 mourners.

Aliza Shevrin is the foremost translator of Sholem Aleichem, having translated eight other volumes of his fiction.

Dan Miron is the William Kay Professor of Hebrew and Comparative Literature at Columbia University.

Product Details

• Reading level: Ages 18 and up
  
• Paperback: 416 pages
• Publisher: Penguin Classics; New edition (January 27, 2009)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0143105604
• ISBN-13: 978-0143105602
• Product Dimensions: 7.6 x 5 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 8.8 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #89,658 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

2 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Needs More Tevye, March 29, 2010

By 

Lane Silberstein - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Tevye the Dairyman and Motl the Cantor's Son (Penguin Classics) (Paperback)

Miron writes an excellent introduction with excellent literary analyses of both the Tevye and Motl stories, and that might be the best part of this book. Furthermore, I would not say there is one definitive translator of Aleichem's work - they are all equally talented (and quite talented at that). But, then again, I am not a scholar like Reb Tevye!

Also included is a Yiddish glossary.

I gave it four stars, though, because I simply wanted more Tevye - but it is also true that no single volume will contain enough Sholem Aleichem to fully sate a reader's appetite.