Tevye the Dairyman and Motl the Cantor's Son [Audiobook, CD] [Audio CD]

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

Book Description

Publication Date: March 1, 2009

Sholem Aleichem, the towering genius of Yiddish literature, created two of the most celebrated characters in all of Jewish fiction — Tevye the Dairyman and Motl the Cantor’s Son. Tevye is the lovable, Bible-quoting father of seven daughters, a modern Job whose wisdom, humor, and resilience inspired the lead character in the classic Fiddler on the Roof. And Motl is the mischievous nine-year-old boy who journeys with his family from their Russian shtetl to New York, and whose comical, poignant, and clear-eyed observations capture with remarkable insight the struggles, hopes, and triumphs of Jewish immigrants to America at the dawn of the 20th century. Newly translated by the foremost Aleichem translator, Aliza Shevrin, these lively interpretations reveal why, when the two famous authors finally met, Mark Twain told Aleichem that he thought of himself as the “American Sholem Aleichem.”

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 --This text refers to the Paperback edition.

About the Author

Sholem Alechiem created the original Tevye the Dairyman of Broadway and Hollywood Fame. He was born in Pereyaslev, Ukraine. The pogroms of 1905 drove him to the United States.

Miron is the Leonard Kay Chair for Hebrew and Comparative Literature at Columbia University. He also teaches at Hebrew University of Jerusalem and is an internationally recognized literary critic.

Product Details

• Audio CD
• Publisher: Audio Literature (March 1, 2009)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1574535935
• ISBN-13: 978-1574535938
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #11,176,935 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.