Sunday, May 10, 2026

아이작 바셰비스 싱어 - 위키백과, Isaac Bashevis Singer

아이작 바셰비스 싱어 - 위키백과, 우리 모두의 백과사전

아이작 바셰비스 싱어

위키백과, 우리 모두의 백과사전.
아이작 바셰비스 싱어
작가 정보
국적 미국
언어이디시어
직업소설가, 단편 소설 작가
장르산문
영향
영향 준 인물크누트 함순
서명

아이작 바셰비스 싱어(영어: Isaac Bashevis Singer, 이디시어: יצחק באַשעװיס זינגער 이츠호크 바셰비스 징게르, 1902년 11월 21일 ~ 1991년 7월 24일)는 폴란드 태생 미국의 유대계 소설가로, 이디시어 문학을 대표하는 인물 가운데 하나로 손꼽힌다.

그는 1935년 나치 독일의 유대인 박해를 피하기 위해 미국으로 망명했으며 뉴욕에 머무르는 동안 이디시어로 된 유대인 일간지 《데일리 포워드(Daily Forward)》의 기자로 근무했다. 그는 1943년에 미국 시민권을 취득했으며 주로 단편 소설가로 활동했다. 그는 1978년에 노벨 문학상을 수상했다.

==

アイザック・バシェヴィス・シンガー

出典: フリー百科事典『ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』
アイザック・バシェヴィス・シンガー
生誕1903年11月11日
ロシア帝国の旗 ロシア帝国（現ポーランドの旗 ポーランド） ラジミン
死没1991年7月24日（87歳没）
アメリカ合衆国の旗 アメリカ合衆国フロリダ州マイアミ
職業作家
言語イディッシュ語
民族ポーランド系ユダヤ人
市民権アメリカ合衆国の旗 アメリカ合衆国
ジャンル散文
主な受賞歴ノーベル文学賞(1978)
 ウィキポータル 文学
テンプレートを表示
ノーベル賞受賞者 
受賞年： 1978年
受賞部門： ノーベル文学賞
受賞理由： 『「ポーランド·ユダヤ文化の伝統に根ざし、生命に普遍的な人間の条件をもたらす情熱的な文芸作品に対して。」』

アイザック・バシェヴィス・シンガー（Isaac Bashevis Singer: イディッシュ表記イツホク・バシェヴィス・ジンゲル:יצחק באַשעװיס זינגערあるいはיצחק בת־שבֿעס זינגער ）（1903年11月11日[1] - 1991年7月24日）はポーランド生まれのアメリカのノーベル賞作家。イディッシュ作家として初めてノーベル文学賞を受賞した。動物の権利擁護活動家の先駆者としても知られていた[2]。

生涯

当時ロシア帝国領だったワルシャワ近郊のラジミン（英語版）で生まれる。生まれた時の名前はイツェク=ヘルシュ・ジンゲル（Icek-Hersz Zynger）。父は敬虔派（ハシディズム）のラビで、母バトシェバはラビの娘。筆名のバシェヴィスとは、バトシェバの息子という意味である。兄のイズラエル・ジョシュア・シンガー（英語版）（イディッシュ名イスロエル・イェホイシュエ・ジンゲル）も高名な作家で、弟アイザックに最初の、そして最大の文学的影響を与えた。父はラビであると同時に判事でもあり、ワルシャワの敬虔派ユダヤ教徒の精神的指導者でもあった。

ワルシャワの貧しいユダヤ人街とビウゴライ（英語版）のシュテートルでイディッシュ語に取り巻かれて育ち、1920年、ユダヤ教の神学校に入学したが、やがてビウゴライに戻ってヘブライ語の教師で糊口をしのいだ。ラビを養成する学校での教育は彼に大きな影響を残したが、それと同時に文学にも惹かれており、文壇に迎え入れられることを熱望するようになった。1923年にワルシャワへ移り、兄イズラエルが編集するLiterarische Bleter誌で校正者として働きつつ、兄イズラエルから多大な精神的啓発を受け、また新時代の息吹を吹き込まれた。

1932年、処女作『ゴライの悪魔（英語版）』をポーランドで上梓して文壇デビューを飾る。中世のイディッシュ年代記に擬したスタイルで、17世紀の贋メシアのシャバタイ・ツヴィを取り巻く出来事を描いた小説である。この作品の登場人物は、シンガーの他の作品の登場人物と同様、運命の気まぐれにしばしば翻弄されつつも、固有の情熱や狂気、偏見、妄執を失わない。後年の作品『奴隷』（1962年）でも17世紀を扱っているが、こちらはユダヤ人男性と非ユダヤ人女性の愛の物語である。

1935年に兄を追って渡米。反ユダヤ主義から逃れる目的もあった。このころ、シンガーは最初の妻ラヘルと離婚。ラヘルは息子イスラエルを連れてモスクワへ、次いでパレスチナへ移った。シンガーはニューヨークに居を定め、イディッシュ紙『フォルヴェルツ（פֿאָרװערטס: 前進）』でジャーナリストとして、またコラムニストとして働き始めた。執筆はほとんどイディッシュ語のみで行い、ヴァルショフスキ（Warszawski、ワルシャワっ子）という筆名を使うこともあった。1940年にドイツ移民アルマ・ハイマン（Alma Heimann）と再婚。1943年に米国の市民権を獲得して正式に米国人となる。今日なお週刊誌として存続している『フォルヴェルツ』紙との縁は、生涯にわたって続いた。

イディッシュ語の持つ力

1940年代にはヨーロッパから多数のアシュケナジムが移民として米国に渡ったが、これらの移民の間でシンガーの文名は徐々に高まり始めた。イディッシュ語の話し手はホロコーストでほぼ死に絶えてしまったため、第二次世界大戦後になるとイディッシュ語は「死んだ言語」と見なされがちだったが、シンガーはイディッシュ語が持つ力を信じ、イディッシュ語を読みたいと熱望する読者が多数いることを知っていたのである。1979年2月の『エンカウンター（英語版）』誌のインタビューでシンガーは次のように語っている。すなわちポーランドのユダヤ人はほぼ死に絶えてしまったが「何かが…魂とも呼ぶことのできる何かが…宇宙のどこかにまだ漂っている。これは神秘的な感覚だが、真実はこの感覚の中にあるのだと私は感じている」と。シンガーの文学が過去の偉大なイディッシュ文学の伝統（たとえばショーロム・アレイヘム）に多くを負っていることは疑い得ないが、彼の場合はアプローチの手法が遥かに現代的で、かつアメリカ生活の経験からも大きな影響を受けている点に特色がある。中世のイディッシュ民話から魔術・神秘・伝説などの題材を駆りながらも、そこに現代的なアイロニーを盛り込んでいるところに独創性があるといえよう。これらの主題は、奇妙なものやグロテスクなものとも関連している。

シンガーは18冊の長篇小説をしたため、14冊の童話を出し、無数の回想録や随筆や記事を書いたが、彼の本領は12冊以上にのぼる短篇集にある。英語による最初の短篇集は『馬鹿のギンペル（英語版）』（1957年）で、表題作は1952年、ソール・ベローによって英訳され、『パルチザン・レビュー（英語版）』誌に登場した。『フォルヴェルツ』に掲載された短篇は、のちに『父の法廷』（1966年）などの短篇集にまとめられた。この短篇集には「羽の冠」（1973年）、「市場通りのスピノザ」（1961年）、そして実在のイディッシュ俳優ジャック・レヴィ（英語版）をモデルにした「カフカの友人」（1970年）などの名作が収録されている。彼の作品世界は、ゲットーやシュテートルで貧困と迫害の中に生きる東欧のユダヤ人社会に舞台を取り、そこでは盲信や迷信が素朴な信仰や儀式と渾然一体になっている。喜びと苦しみ、粗野と繊細、そこでは全てが混沌としている。野卑で淫らでけばけばしい原色の世界に、英知や諧謔が溶け込んでいるところに魅力があるといえよう。

英訳による読者の広がり

1952年のソール・ベローによる翻訳によってアメリカの読者から幅広い関心を集めたことをきっかけに、シンガーの作品は親類や友人らの助けを得て相次いで英訳刊行されることになった。やがて英語で書く作家たちとともにアメリカ・ユダヤ系作家のアンソロジーにも作品が収録されるようにもなり、シンガーはイディッシュ語作家でありつつもアメリカの代表的作家としても認められるようになる。1970年には全米図書賞の児童書部門で、1974年にはその小説部門で受賞を果たし、評価の点でもアメリカの第一線の作家らと肩を並べた。

シンガーの最も重要なテーマの一つに、新旧両世界の価値観のせめぎ合いという問題がある。これは主にシンガーの一族を描いた連作長篇『モスカット家一族（英語版）』（1950年）、『領地（イタリア語版）』（1967年）、『財産（イタリア語版）』（1969年）などに登場するテーマで、時にトーマス・マンの『ブッデンブローク家の人々』にたとえられることがある。これらの作品では、19世紀から第二次世界大戦に至る時代を背景にして、旧家の一族が新しい世代によって分裂し零落する有様を描いている。

1960年代を通じて、シンガーは個人的な倫理の問題を追究し続けた。特に有名な作品は『敵たち、ある愛の物語』で、映画化もされている(邦題『敵、ある愛の物語』、監督:ポール・マザースキー、制作:1989年)。これは、ホロコーストのある生き残りが、いかに己の欲望や複雑な家族関係と向き合い、信仰を失うかを描いた物語である。もう一つの作品・短編『イェントル、イェシーバーの少年』はフェミニスト小説で、ミュージカル映画化されており（邦題『愛のイエントル』、監督・主演:バーブラ・ストライサンド、制作:1983年）、映画になったために、後世への文化的影響力を持ち続けている。

シンガー自身の宗教との向き合い方は複雑だった。正統派のユダヤ教に絆を感じつつも、自分自身を懐疑論者かつ個人主義者と見なしていたからである。彼自身の思想は最終的に「私的神秘主義」と彼が呼ぶものに変遷した。「なぜなら神は完全に不可知で永遠に何も語らないので、人が想定するどんな特徴でも持っているだろうからだ」と彼は語った。

1978年にノーベル文学賞を受けてからは、世界中の文学者の間で不滅の名声を獲得した。むしろ、イディッシュ作家からの評価よりも、非ユダヤ人からの評価のほうが高い。しかし、しばしば性的な話題を取り上げたため、敬虔なユダヤ教徒からは顰蹙を買うこともあった。

1991年、脳卒中のためフロリダ州マイアミで病死した。彼は「動物にとって、毎日がトレブリンカだ」と述べており[3]、亡くなるまでの35年間、熱心な菜食主義者としても知られた。

作品

長篇小説
『フォルヴェルツ』連載, 1959年、英訳版, 1960年
『フォルヴェルツ』連載, 1973年、イディッシュ語版, 1974年、英訳版, 1983年
  • 『罠におちた男』(英訳版, 1991年) 。島田太郎訳、晶文社、1995年
  • 『メシュガー』 大崎ふみ子訳、吉夏社、2016年
『フォルヴェルツ』連載, 1981-82年、英訳版, 1994年--『ショーシャ』の続編的作品
  • 『モスカット一族』 大崎ふみ子訳、未知谷、2024年
  • 『ゴライの悪魔』 大崎ふみ子訳、未知谷、2025年--処女長篇
  • 『今はない世界のこと』 大崎ふみ子訳、未知谷、2026年--自伝風作品
短編小説・作品集
  • 『短かい金曜日』邦高忠二訳、晶文社、1971年
  • 『羽の冠』(英訳版, 1973年) 田内初義訳、新書館、1976年
  • 『愛のイエントル』邦高忠二訳、晶文社、1984年
  • 『カフカの友と20の物語』村川武彦訳、彩流社、2006年
  • 『タイベレと彼女の悪魔』大崎ふみ子訳、吉夏社、2007年
  • 『父の法廷』桑山孝子訳、未知谷、2009年
  • 『不浄の血　アイザック・バシェヴィス・シンガー傑作選』西成彦訳、河出書房新社、2013年
児童文学
  • 『どれいになったエリア』猪熊葉子訳、福音館書店、1971年
  • 『ワルシャワで大人になっていく少年の物語』金敷力訳、新潮社、1974年
    • 『よろこびの日 ワルシャワの少年時代』工藤幸雄訳、岩波少年文庫、1990年--上記の改訳
  • 『メイゼルとシュリメイゼル 運をつかさどる妖精たちの話』木庭茂夫訳、冨山房、1976年
  • 『ヘルムのあんぽん譚』関憲治訳、篠崎書林、1979年
  • 『やぎと少年（英語版）』工藤幸雄訳、岩波書店、1979年
モーリス・センダック 絵、のち新装版・岩波世界児童文学集、2003年
  • 『お話を運んだ馬』工藤幸雄訳、岩波少年文庫、1981年、のち改版　
  • 『まぬけなワルシャワ旅行』工藤幸雄訳、岩波少年文庫、1983年、のち改版
  • 『ばかものギンペルと10の物語』村川武彦訳、彩流社、2011年

評伝・研究

  • クライヴ・シンクレア『ユダヤ人の兄弟　アイザック・B・シンガーとその兄』 井上謙治訳、晶文社、1986年
  • 広瀬佳司『アウトサイダーを求めて　I・B・シンガーの世界』旺史社、1991年
  • イスラエル・ザミラ『わが父 アイザック・B・シンガー』 広瀬佳司訳、旺史社、1999年
  • 大崎ふみ子『アイザック・B・シンガー研究　二つの世界の狭間で』吉夏社、2010年

脚注

  1.  “Is today actually Isaac Bashevis Singer's birthday?” (英語). Literary Hub (2020年11月11日). 2021年9月14日閲覧。
  2.  「ナタリー・ポートマン、動物の権利を訴える動画公開。」『ヴォーグ (雑誌)』2018年7月18日。
  3.  ヘルムート・F・カプラン『死体の晩餐』同時代社、2005年。

外部リンク

==

Isaac Bashevis Singer

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
For the American inventor, see Isaac Singer.
Isaac Bashevis Singer
Portrait c. 1980–1990
Portrait c. 1980–1990
Native name
יצחק באַשעװיס זינגער
Born
Izaak Zynger

November 11, 1903
Leoncin, Congress Poland, Russian Empire
DiedJuly 24, 1991 (aged 87)
Surfside, Florida, United States
Resting placeCedar Park Cemetery,
Paramus, New Jersey, U.S.
Pen nameBashevis,
Warszawski (pron. Varshavsky),
D. Segal
OccupationNovelist, short story writer
LanguageYiddish
CitizenshipPoland, United States
GenreFictional prose
Notable worksThe Magician of Lublin
A Day of Pleasure
Notable awards
Signature

Isaac Bashevis Singer (Yiddish: יצחק באַשעװיס זינגער; November 11, 1903[1][2][3] – July 24, 1991) was a Polish-born Jewish American novelist, short-story writer, memoirist, essayist, and translator in the United States. Some of his works were adapted for the theater. He wrote and published first in Yiddish and later translated his own works into English with the help of editors and collaborators.[4][5] He was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1978.[6][7] A leading figure in the Yiddish literary movement, he was awarded two U.S. National Book Awards, one in Children's Literature for his memoir A Day of Pleasure: Stories of a Boy Growing Up in Warsaw (1970)[8] and one in Fiction for his collection A Crown of Feathers and Other Stories (1974).[9]

Life

Isaac (right) with his brother Israel Joshua Singer (1930s)
Krochmalna Street in Warsaw near the place where the Singers lived (1940 or 1941)
Singer's bench in Biłgoraj
Commemorative plaque at 1 Krochmalna Street in Warsaw

Isaac Bashevis Singer was born in 1903[1] to a Jewish family in Leoncin village near Warsaw, Poland.[10] The Polish form of his birth name was Icek Hersz Zynger.[11] The exact date of his birth is uncertain, but most sources say it was probably November 11, a date similar to the one that Singer gave to his official biographer Paul Kresh,[12] his secretary Dvorah Telushkin,[13] and Rabbi William Berkowitz.[14] Some sources mention 1902. The year 1903 is consistent with the historical events that his brother refers to in their childhood memoirs, including the death of Theodor Herzl. The often-quoted birth date, July 14, 1904, was made up by the author in his youth, possibly to make himself younger to avoid the draft.[15]

His father Pinchus-Mendel Zinger (1868–?) was a Hasidic rabbi from Tomaszów Lubelski (Lublin Governorate), and his mother, Szewa (née Zilberman, 1871–?) was from Poritsk [uk] (Vladimir-Volynsky Uyezd, Volhynia Governorate); parents registered their marriage on June 2 (14) 1889 in Biłgoraj.[16] Singer later used her first name in an initial literary pseudonym, Izaak Baszewis, which he later expanded.[17] Both his older siblings, sister Esther Kreitman (1891–1954) and brother Israel Joshua Singer (1893–1944), became writers as well. Esther was the first of the family to write stories.[18]

The family moved to the court of the Rabbi of Radzymin in 1907, where his father became head of the Yeshiva. After the Yeshiva building burned down in 1908, the family moved to Warsaw, a flat at Krochmalna Street 10. In the spring of 1914, the Singers moved to No. 12.[19]

The street where Singer grew up was located in the impoverished, Yiddish-speaking Jewish quarter of Warsaw. There his father served as a rabbi, and was called on to be a judge, arbitrator, religious authority and spiritual leader in the Jewish community.[20] The unique atmosphere of pre-war Krochmalna Street can be found both in the collection of Varshavsky-stories, which tell stories from Singer's childhood,[21] as well as in those novels and stories which take place in pre-war Warsaw.[22]

World War I

In 1917, because of the hardships of World War I, the family split up. Singer moved with his mother and younger brother Moshe to Biłgoraj, a traditional shtetl, where his mother's brothers had followed his grandfather as rabbis.[20] When his father became a village rabbi again in 1921, Singer returned to Warsaw. He entered the Tachkemoni Rabbinical Seminary and soon decided that neither the school nor the profession suited him. He returned to Biłgoraj, where he tried to support himself by giving Hebrew lessons, but soon gave up and joined his parents, considering himself a failure. In 1923, his older brother Israel Joshua arranged for him to move to Warsaw to work as a proofreader for the Jewish magazine Literarishe Bleter, of which the brother was an editor.[23]

Cover of the Literarishe Bleter

United States

In 1935, four years before the Nazi invasion, Singer emigrated from Poland to the United States.[24] He was fearful of the growing threat in neighboring Germany.[25] The move separated the author from his common-law first wife Runia Pontsch and son Israel Zamir (1929–2014); they immigrated to Moscow and then Palestine. The three met again in 1955.[citation needed]

Singer settled in New York City, where he took up work as a journalist and columnist for The Jewish Daily Forward (פֿאָרװערטס), a Yiddish-language newspaper. (When he arrived in the US, he only knew three words of English: "Take a chair".[24]) After a promising start, he became despondent and for some years felt Lost in America (title of his 1974 memoir published in Yiddish; published in English in 1981).[citation needed]

In 1938, he met Alma Wassermann (née Haimann) (1907–1996), a German-Jewish refugee from Munich. They married in 1940, and their union seemed to release energy in him; he returned to prolific writing and to contributing to the Forward. In addition to his pen name of "Bashevis", he published under the pen names of "Warszawski" (pron. Varshavsky) during World War II,[26] and "D. Segal".[27] They lived for many years in the Belnord apartment building on Manhattan's Upper West Side.[28] He became a US citizen in 1943.[24]

In 1981, Singer delivered a commencement address at the University at Albany and was presented with an honorary doctorate.[29]

A resident of Surfside, Florida, Singer died on July 24, 1991, after suffering a series of strokes.[30] He was buried in Cedar Park Cemetery, Paramus, New Jersey.[31] 95th Street in Surfside is named Isaac Singer Boulevard in his honor.[32]

Literary career

Singer's first published story "Oyf der elter" ("In Old Age", 1925) won the literary competition of the Literarishe Bleter, where he worked as a proofreader.[33] A reflection of his formative years in "the kitchen of literature"[34] can be found in many of his later works. In 1933, Singer published his first novel, Satan in Goray, in installments in the literary magazine Globus, which he had co-founded with his lifelong friend, the Yiddish poet Aaron Zeitlin. It is set in the years following 1648, when the Chmielnicki massacres, considered one of the greatest Jewish catastrophes, occurred. The story describes the Jewish messianic cult that arose in the village of Goraj. It explores the effects of the faraway false messiah, Shabbatai Zvi, on the local population. Its last chapter imitates the style of a medieval Yiddish chronicle. With a stark depiction of innocence crushed by circumstance, the novel appears to foreshadow coming danger. In his later work The Slave (1962), Singer returns to the aftermath of 1648 in a love story between a Jewish man and a gentile woman. He portrays the traumatized and desperate survivors of the historic catastrophe with even deeper understanding.

The Family Moskat

Singer became a literary contributor to The Jewish Daily Forward only after his older brother Israel died in 1944. That year, Singer published The Family Moskat in his brother's honor. His own style showed in the daring turns of his action and characters, with double adultery during the holiest of nights of Judaism, the evening of Yom Kippur (despite being printed in a Jewish family newspaper in 1945). He was nearly forced to stop writing the novel by his editor-in-chief, Abraham Cahan, but was saved by readers who wanted the story to continue.[citation needed] After this, his stories—which he had published in Yiddish literary newspapers before—were printed in the Forward as well. Throughout the 1940s, Singer's reputation grew.

Singer believed in the power of his native language and thought that there was still a large audience, including in New York, who longed to read in Yiddish. In an interview in Encounter (February 1979), he said that although the Jews of Poland had died, "something—call it spirit or whatever—is still somewhere in the universe. This is a mystical kind of feeling, but I feel there is truth in it."

Some of his colleagues and readers were shocked by his all-encompassing view of human nature. He wrote about female homosexuality ("Zeitl and Rickel",[35] "Tseytl un Rikl"), published in The Seance and Other Stories,[36] transvestism ("Yentl the Yeshiva Boy" in Short Friday), and of rabbis corrupted by demons ("Zeidlus the Pope" in Short Friday). In those novels and stories which refer to events in his own life, he portrays himself unflatteringly (with some degree of accuracy) as an artist who is self-centered yet has a keen eye for the sufferings and tribulations of others.

Literary influences

Singer in 1969

Singer had many literary influences. Besides the religious texts he studied, he grew up with a rich array of Jewish folktales and worldly Yiddish detective-stories about Max Spitzkopf and his assistant Fuchs by Jonas Kreppel.[37] He read Russian, including Dostoyevsky's Crime and Punishment at the age of fourteen.[38] He wrote in memoirs about the importance of the Yiddish translations donated in book-crates from America, which he studied as a teenager in Bilgoraj: "I read everything: Stories, novels, plays, essays... I read Rajsen, Strindberg, Don Kaplanowitsch, Turgenev, Tolstoy, Maupassant and Chekhov."[38] He studied the philosophers Spinoza,[38] Arthur Schopenhauer,[18] and Otto Weininger.[39] Among his Yiddish contemporaries, Singer considered his elder brother to be his greatest artistic example. He was also a life-long friend and admirer of the author and poet Aaron Zeitlin.

His short stories, which some critics feel contain his most lasting contributions,[40] were influenced by Anton Chekhov and Guy de Maupassant. From Maupassant, Singer developed a finely grained sense of drama. Like those of the French master, Singer's stories can pack enormous visceral excitement in the space of a few pages.[citation needed] From Chekhov, Singer developed his ability to draw characters of enormous complexity and dignity in the briefest of spaces.[citation needed] In the foreword to his personally selected volume of his finest short stories, Singer describes Chekhov, Maupassant, and "the sublime scribe of the Joseph story in the Book of Genesis" as the masters of the short story form.[41]

Of his non-Yiddish-contemporaries, he was strongly influenced by the writings of Knut Hamsun, many of whose works he later translated, while he had a more critical attitude towards Thomas Mann, whose approach to writing he considered opposed to his own.[42] Contrary to Hamsun's approach, Singer shaped his world not only with the egos of his characters, but also from Jewish moral tradition embodied by his father in the stories about Singer's youth. There was a dichotomy between the life his heroes lead and the life they feel they should lead—which gives his art a modernity his predecessors did not express. Singer's stories often involve highly individualist and anti-conformist characters rebelling alone against society. In a 1974 interview, Singer stated that "every human being, if he is a real, sensitive human being, feels quite isolated. It is only the people with very little individuality who always feel that they belong." He added that "Since I believe that the purpose of literature is to stress individuality, I also, unwillingly, stress human lonesomeness".[43]

Singer's themes of witchcraft, mystery and legend draw on traditional sources, but they are contrasted with a modern and ironic consciousness. They are also concerned with the bizarre and the grotesque.[citation needed]

An important strand of his art is intra-familial strife, which he experienced when taking refuge with his mother and younger brother at his uncle's home in Biłgoraj. This is the central theme in Singer's family chronicles such as The Family Moskat (1950), The Manor (1967), and The Estate (1969). Some critics believe these show the influence of Thomas Mann's novel Buddenbrooks; Singer had translated Mann's Der Zauberberg (The Magic Mountain) into Yiddish as a young writer.

Language

Singer always wrote and published in Yiddish. His novels were serialized in newspapers, which also published his short stories. He edited his novels and stories for publication in English, which was used as the basis for translation into other languages. Some of Singer's stories and novels have not been translated.[44]

Illustrators

The artists who have illustrated Singer's novels, short stories, and children's books, include Raphael Soyer, Maurice Sendak, Larry Rivers, and Irene Lieblich. Singer personally selected Lieblich to illustrate two of his books for children, A Tale of Three Wishes and The Power of Light: Eight Stories for Hanukkah, after seeing her paintings at an Artists Equity exhibition in New York City. A Holocaust survivor, Lieblich was from Zamosc, Poland, a town adjacent to the area where Singer was raised. As their memories of shtetl life were so similar, Singer found Lieblich's images ideally suited to illustrate his texts. Of her style, Singer wrote that "her works are rooted in Jewish folklore and are faithful to Jewish life and the Jewish spirit."[45]

Summary

Singer published at least 18 novels, 14 children's books, a number of memoirs, essays and articles. He is best known as a writer of short stories, which have been published in more than a dozen collections. The first collection of Singer's short stories in English, Gimpel the Fool, was published in 1957. The title story was translated by Saul Bellow and published in May 1953 in the Partisan Review. Selections from Singer's "Varshavsky-stories" in the Daily Forward were later published in anthologies such as My Father's Court (1966). Later collections include A Crown of Feathers (1973), with notable masterpieces in between, such as The Spinoza of Market Street (1961) and A Friend of Kafka (1970). His stories and novels reflect the world of the East European Jewry in which he grew up. After his many years in America, his stories also portrayed the world of the immigrants and their pursuit of an elusive American dream, which seems always beyond reach.

Prior to Singer's winning the Nobel Prize, English translations of dozens of his stories were published in popular magazines like The New Yorker,[46] Playboy and Esquire that published literary works.

Singer was awarded the Nobel Prize in 1978.[7]

Between 1981 and 1989, Singer contributed articles to Moment, an independent magazine which focuses on the life of the American Jewish community.[47]

Film adaptations

His novel Enemies, A Love Story was adapted as a film by the same name (1989) and was quite popular, bringing new readers to his work. It features a Holocaust survivor who deals with varying desires, complex family relationships, and a loss of faith.

Singer's story, "Yentl, the Yeshiva Boy" was adapted into a stage version by Leah Napolin (with Singer), which was the basis for the film Yentl (1983) starring and directed by Barbra Streisand. In 1984, The New York Times published Singer's self-interview, where he disapproved of the film.[48]

Alan Arkin starred as Yasha, the principal character in the film version of The Magician of Lublin (1979), which also featured Shelley Winters, Louise Fletcher, Valerie Perrine and Lou Jacobi. In the final scene, Yasha achieves his lifelong ambition of being able to fly, though not as the magic trick he had originally planned.

Perhaps the most fascinating[49] Singer-inspired film is Mr. Singer's Nightmare and Mrs. Pupkos Beard (1974) directed by Bruce Davidson, a renowned photographer who became Singer's neighbor. This unique film is a half-hour mixture of documentary and fantasy for which Singer wrote the script and played the leading role.

The 2007 film Love Comes Lately, starring Otto Tausig, was adapted from several of Singer's stories.

Views and opinions

Judaism

Singer's relationship to Judaism was complex and unconventional. He identified as a skeptic and a loner, though he felt a connection to his Orthodox roots. Ultimately, he developed a view of religion and philosophy which he called "private mysticism". As he put it, "Since God was completely unknown and eternally silent, He could be endowed with whatever traits one elected to hang upon Him."[50][51]

Singer was raised Orthodox and learned all the Jewish prayers, studied Hebrew and learned Torah and Talmud. As he recounted in the autobiographical short story "In My Father's Court", he broke away from his parents in his early twenties. Influenced by his older brother, who had done the same, he began spending time with non-religious bohemian artists in Warsaw. Although Singer believed in a God, as in traditional Judaism, he stopped attending Jewish religious services of any kind, even on the High Holy Days. He struggled throughout his life with the feeling that a kind and compassionate God would never support the great suffering he saw around him, especially the Holocaust deaths of so many of the Polish Jews from his childhood. In one interview with the photographer Richard Kaplan, he said, "I am angry at God because of what happened to my brothers": Singer's older brother died suddenly in February 1944, in New York, of a thrombosis; his younger brother perished in Soviet Russia around 1945, after being deported with his mother and wife to Southern Kazakhstan in Stalin's purges.

Despite the complexities of his religious outlook, Singer lived in the midst of the Jewish community throughout his life. He did not seem to be comfortable unless he was surrounded by Jews; particularly Jews born in Europe. Although he spoke English, Hebrew, and Polish fluently, he always considered Yiddish his natural tongue. He always wrote in Yiddish and he was the last notable American author to be writing in this language.[citation needed] After he had achieved success as a writer in New York, Singer and his wife began spending time during the winters in Miami with its Jewish community, many of them New Yorkers.

Eventually, as senior citizens, they moved to Miami. They identified closely with the Ashkenazi Jewish community. After his death, Singer was buried in a traditional Jewish ceremony in Cedar Park Cemetery, a Jewish cemetery in Paramus, New Jersey.

Vegetarianism

Singer was a prominent Jewish vegetarian[52] for the last 35 years of his life and often included vegetarian themes in his works. In his short story "The Slaughterer", he described the anguish of an appointed slaughterer trying to reconcile his compassion for animals with his job of killing them. He felt that the ingestion of meat was a denial of all ideals and all religions: "How can we speak of right and justice if we take an innocent creature and shed its blood?" When asked if he had become a vegetarian for health reasons, he replied: "I did it for the health of the chickens."

Vegetarianism is a recurrent theme in Singer's novel Enemies, a Love Story. One character, a Holocaust survivor, declares that "God himself eats meat—human flesh. There are no vegetarians—none. If you had seen what I have seen, you would know that God approves of slaughter,"[53] and another character points out "that what the Nazis had done to the Jews, man was doing to animals."[54] In The Letter Writer, Singer wrote "In relation to [animals], all people are Nazis; for the animals, it is an eternal Treblinka,"[55] which became a classic reference in the comparison of animal exploitation with the Holocaust.[56]

In the preface to Steven Rosen's Food for Spirit: Vegetarianism and the World Religions (1986), Singer wrote, "When a human kills an animal for food, he is neglecting his own hunger for justice. Man prays for mercy, but is unwilling to extend it to others. Why should man then expect mercy from God? It's unfair to expect something that you are not willing to give. It is inconsistent. I can never accept inconsistency or injustice. Even if it comes from God. If there would come a voice from God saying, 'I'm against vegetarianism!' I would say, 'Well, I am for it!' This is how strongly I feel in this regard."

Politics

Singer described himself as "conservative," adding that "I don't believe by flattering the masses all the time we really achieve much."[57] His conservative side was most apparent in his Yiddish writing and journalism, where he was openly hostile to Marxist sociopolitical agendas. In Forverts he once wrote, "It may seem like terrible apikorses [heresy], but conservative governments in America, England, France, have handled Jews no worse than liberal governments.... The Jew's worst enemies were always those elements that the modern Jew convinced himself (really hypnotized himself) were his friends."[6][58]

Zionism

The typewriter that Singer used during his visits to Israel in the 1970s

Issac Bashevis was ambivalent on the question of Zionism, and he viewed the immigration of Jews to Palestine critically. As a Polish Jew from Warsaw, he was historically confronted with the question of the Jewish fate during Nazi persecution. He exercised social responsibility towards the immigration of European and American Jewish groups to Israel after World War II. Strictly based on Jewish family doctrine rather than politics and socialism, his former partner Runya Pontsch and his son Israel Zamir immigrated to Palestine in 1938, in order to live a typical kibbutz life there. In his story The Certificate (1967), which has autobiographical character, he fictionalizes this question from a time in the mid-1920s when he was himself considering moving to the British Mandate Palestine. The protagonist of the story decides to leave Palestine, however, to move back into his shtetl. For Singer then, Zionism becomes the "road not taken". However, through his journalistic assignments in late 1955, Singer made his first trip to Israel, accompanied by his wife Alma. Describing the trip to his Yiddish readers, he introduces the world for the first time to the young state of Israel. In a change of mind, he then describes the Land of Israel as a "reality, and part of everyday life." Interestingly enough, he notes the cultural tensions between Sephardic and Ashkenazi Jewish people during the boat trip from Naples to Haifa and during his stay in the new nation. With the description of Jewish immigration camps in the new land, he foresaw the difficulties and socio-economic tensions in Israel, and hence turned back to his critical views of Zionism. He scrutinized the ideology further, as he was advancing his thought of critical Zionism.[59][60]

Singer was a member of the executive committee of the Writers and Artists for Peace in the Middle East, a pro-Israel group.[61] In 1984, he signed a letter protesting German arms sales to Saudi Arabia.[62]

Legacy and honors

Awards and prizes

Along with Czesław Miłosz, Singer is a rare American Nobel Laureate in Literature that didn't receive a Pulitzer Prize award or citation.[citation needed]

Other honors and recognition

  • An academic scholarship for undergraduate study at the University of Miami, named in his honor[68]
  • The Jewish-American Hall of Fame[24]
  • A street in Surfside, Florida, named in his honor
  • A street in New York City named in his honor (W. 86th St.)
  • A street in Leoncin, Poland, named in his honor (ul. Isaaca Bashevisa Singera)
  • A commemorative plaque attached to a front wall of a building where Singer and his family resided in Radzymin, Poland (ul. Stary Rynek 7, 05-250 Radzymin)
  • A park square in Radzymin, named in his honor (skwer im. Isaaca Bashevisa Singera)
  • A city square in Lublin, Poland, a hometown of the protagonist of The Magician of Lublin novel, named in writer's honor (pl. Isaaka Singera)
  • A street in Biłgoraj, Poland, named in his honor (ul. Isaaca Bashevisa Singera)
  • A street in Tel Aviv, Israel[69]

Published works

Note: Publication dates refer to English editions, not the Yiddish originals, which often predate the versions in translation by 10 to 20 years.

Novels

Short story collections

  • Gimpel the Fool and Other Stories (1957)—Yiddish original: גימפּל תּם
  • The Spinoza of Market Street (1961)
  • Short Friday and Other Stories (1963)
  • The Séance and Other Stories. 1968a.
  • A Friend of Kafka and Other Stories (1970)
  • A Crown of Feathers and Other Stories (1974)—shared the National Book Award, fiction, with Gravity's Rainbow by Thomas Pynchon[9]
  • Passions and Other Stories (1975)
  • Old Love (1979)
  • The Collected Stories. 1982.
  • The Image and Other Stories (1985)
  • The Death of Methuselah and Other Stories (1988)

Juvenile literature

Nonfiction

  • The Hasidim (1973)

Autobiographical writings

  • Singer, Isaac Bashevis (1967) [1963], In My Father's Court, NY: Farrar, Straus & Giroux—Yiddish original: מיין טאטנ'ס בית דין שטוב
  • Singer, Isaac Bashevis (1969), A Day of Pleasure, Stories of a Boy Growing Up in Warsaw, New York: Doubleday. National Book Award, Children's Literature[8]
  • Singer, Isaac Bashevis (1976), A Little Boy in Search of God, New York: Doubleday.
  • Singer, Isaac Bashevis (1978), A Young Man in Search of Love, New York: Doubleday.
  • Singer, Isaac Bashevis (1981), Lost in America, New York: Doubleday.
  • Singer, Isaac Bashevis (1984), Love and exile, New York: Doubleday.
  • Singer, Isaac Bashevis (1999), More Stories from My Father's Court, NY: Farrar, Straus & Giroux

Short stories

  • Singer, Isaac Bashevis (1963), The New Winds, NY: Farrar, Straus and Giroux.
  • Singer, Isaac Bashevis (Spring 1968), "Zeitl and Rickel", The Hudson Review, 20th Anniversary Issue, 21 (1), Mirra Ginsburg transl.: 127–37, doi:10.2307/3849538, JSTOR 3849538.

Collected works

Films and stage productions based on Singer's work

See also

Citations

  1.  "Is today actually Isaac Bashevis Singer's birthday?". Literary Hub. November 11, 2020. Retrieved November 12, 2020.
  2.  Singer, Isaac Bashevis (November 11, 2019). "Who Needs Literature?". Los Angeles Review of Books. Retrieved November 12, 2020.
  3.  "Biography". Isaac Bashevis Singer. Retrieved November 12, 2020.
  4.  "Isaac Bashevis Singer". Oxford Reference. Retrieved November 12, 2020.
  5.  "Immigration". Yiddish Book Center. Retrieved August 3, 2021.
  6.  "Singer, Isaac Bashevis", The YIVO Encyclopedia of Jews in Eastern Europe.
  7.  Singer, Isaac Bashevis (1978), Lecture, Nobel prize.
  8.  "National Book Awards – 1970". National Book Foundation. Retrieved February 8, 2012.
  9.  "National Book Awards – 1974". National Book Foundation. Retrieved 2012-03-26.
    With essay by Harold Augenbraum from the Awards 60-year anniversary blog.
  10.  "Isaac Bashevis Singer | American author". Encyclopedia Britannica. Retrieved November 12, 2020.
  11.  Florence Noiville (2008). Isaac B. Singer: A Life. Northwestern University Press. p. 65. ISBN 978-0810124820.
  12.  Kresh 1979, p. 390.
  13.  Telushkin 1997, p. 266.
  14.  "New York Day by Day;". The New York Times. September 3, 1984. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved November 21, 2019.
  15.  Tree 2004, pp. 18–19.
  16.  Marriage Record in Polish State Archives (in Russian Language): Father's parents are listed as Tomaszów dwellers Shmul Zinger and Tema Sheyner; mother's parents as Poritsk dwellers Yakov-Mordka Zilberman and Chana Danziger.
  17.  Several of his professional identification cards using localized spellings and further variants of these names are reproduced in: Wollitz, Seth L. (2001). Staley, Thomas F. (ed.). The Hidden Isaac Bashevis Singer. Literary Modernism Series. University of Texas Press. ISBN 978-0-292-79147-3. Retrieved July 28, 2012.
  18.  Carr 1992.
  19.  Leociak, J (2011), Spojrzenia na warszawskie getto. Ulica Krochmalna [Glimpses of the Warsaw Ghetto], Warszawa: Dom Spotkań z Historią, p. 29, OCLC 800883074
  20.  Singer 1967.
  21.  Best known: My Father's Court 1966
  22.  Die familye Mushkat/The Family Moskat 1950, Shoym 1967/Scum 1991, etc.
  23.  Singer 1976.
  24.  "Literature Honoree ― Isaac Bashevis Singer ― The Jewish-American Hall of Fame". amuseum.org. The American Jewish Historical Society & The American Numismatic Society. Retrieved February 7, 2025.
  25.  Maul, Kristina (2007). Communication and Society in Jewish American Short Stories. GRIN Verlag. p. 19. ISBN 9783638843201..
  26.  Shmeruk, Chone; Pekal, Anna (1991). "Isaac Bashevis Singer on Bruno Schulz". The Polish Review. 36 (2): 161–167. ISSN 0032-2970. JSTOR 25778558.
  27.  See both bibliographies (given on this page).
  28.  Horsley, Carter B, "The Belnord", The City Review, archived from the original on March 30, 2010.
  29.  "University at Albany's 137th Annual Commencement", YouTube (video), May 24, 1981, archived from the original on December 11, 2021.
  30.  Pace, Eric (July 26, 1991). "Isaac Bashevis Singer, Nobel Laureate for His Yiddish Stories, Is Dead at 87". The New York Times. Retrieved April 30, 2008..
  31.  Strauss, Robert (March 28, 2004). "Sometimes the Grave Is a Fine and Public Place". The New York Times. Retrieved July 21, 2025..
  32.  Surfside's History: Celebrating 90 Years, Surfside, Florida, October 19, 2023. Accessed July 21, 2025. "Some of the Town’s most infamous guests and residents include organized crime figures like Tony Accardo and Sam Tucker, as well as famed author Isaac Bashevis Singer, who received the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1978. Surfside’s 95th Street is co-named Isaac Bashevis Singer Boulevard in honor of the great Yiddish poet and short-story author."
  33.  "Singer, Isaac Bashevis", by Joseph Sherman, YIVO Encyclopedia
  34.  Telushkin 1997, p. 123.
  35.  Singer 1968.
  36.  Singer 1968a.
  37.  Tree 2004, p. 35.
  38.  Singer 1963.
  39.  Tree 2004, p. 68.
  40.  Searls, Damion (September 1, 2012). "A Guide to Isaac Bashevis Singer". Los Angeles Review of Books. Retrieved April 27, 2022. The opinion seems to have hardened into indisputable fact that Singer's stories are better than his novels, but I'm not convinced.
  41.  Singer 1982, p. vii.
  42.  Tree 2004, p. 88.
  43.  Gilman, Sander L.; Singer, Isaac Bashevis (1974). "Interview: Isaac Bashevis Singer". Diacritics. 4 (1): 30–33. doi:10.2307/464611. ISSN 0300-7162. JSTOR 464611.
  44.  Searls, Damion (September 1, 2012). "A Guide to Isaac Bashevis Singer". Los Angeles Review of Books. Retrieved April 26, 2022. There are several novels still untranslated into English.
  45.  The Pakn Treger. The Center. 2002.
  46.  "Isaac Bashevis Singer". The New Yorker. Retrieved April 8, 2024.
  47.  Bashevis Singer, Isaac. Moment Magazine. Digital Archives: Opinion Archives.
  48.  Singer, Isaac Bashevis (29 January 1984). I.B. Singer talks to I.B. Singer about the movie 'Yentl' The New York Times. Retrieved on 20 April 2026.
  49.  Tree 2004, p. 161.
  50.  Grace Farrell, Isaac Bashevis Singer: Conversations, p. 236, University Press of Mississippi, 1992.
  51.  Singer 1984, p. 99.
  52.  "Isaac Bashevis Singer (1904–1991)", History of Vegetarianism, IVU, archived from the original on December 22, 2008, retrieved February 18, 2009.
  53.  Singer, Isaac Bashevis (1972). Enemies, a Love Story. Noonday Press. p. 33. ISBN 0374515220.
  54.  Singer, Isaac Bashevis (1972). Enemies, a Love Story. Noonday Press. p. 145. ISBN 0374515220.
  55.  Singer 1982, p. 271.
  56.  Patterson, Charles (2002). Eternal Treblinka: Our Treatment of Animals and the Holocaust. New York: Lantern Books, pp. 181–188.
  57.  Burgin, Richard; Singer, Isaac Bashevis (Spring 1980), "A Conversation with Isaac Bashevis Singer", Chicago Review, 31 (4): 57, doi:10.2307/25304019, hdl:2027/spo.act2080.0017.002, JSTOR 25304019
  58.  Hadda 1997, pp. 137–38.
  59.  David Stromberg (June 12, 2018). "Faith in Place: Isaac Bashevis Singer in Israel". L.A. Review of Books. Retrieved May 13, 2021.
  60.  Sale, Roger (November 2, 1975). "Isaac Bashevis Singer, also known as 'I'". The New York Times. Retrieved May 13, 2021.
  61.  "GOP Platform Committee Urged to Give Support to Israel". Jewish Telegraphic Agency. August 10, 1976. Retrieved May 13, 2021.
  62.  "Jewish Groups, Writers and Artists Join in a Campaign Urging Germany to Reconsider Arms Sales to Sau". Jewish Telegraphic Agency. January 31, 1984. Retrieved March 30, 2025.
  63.  "Past Winners". Jewish Book Council. Archived from the original on March 8, 2020. Retrieved January 19, 2020.
  64.  Stromberg, David (June 13, 2016). "Rebellion and Creativity: Contextualizing Isaac Bashevis Singer's "Author's Note" to The Penitent". In Geveb: A Journal of Yiddish Studies.
  65.  "National Book Awards 1970". nationalbook.org. National Book Foundation. Retrieved February 7, 2025.
  66.  "National Book Awards 1974". nationalbook.org. National Book Foundation. Retrieved February 7, 2025.
  67.  "1974". nbafictionblog.org. National Book Foundation. August 1, 2009. Archived from the original on August 15, 2017. Retrieved February 7, 2025.
  68.  "Isaac Bashevis Singer Scholarship". miami.edu. University of Miami. Retrieved February 7, 2025.
  69.  "His son Israel Zamir in the inauguration". Archived from the original on June 26, 2021. Retrieved June 26, 2021.
  70.  Mendelsohn, Ezra (1997). "The Perils of Translation: Isaac Bashevis Singer in English and Hebrew". The Perils of Translation: Isaac Bashevis Singer. Oxford University Press. pp. 228–233. doi:10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195112030.003.0013. ISBN 978-0-19-511203-0.
  71.  "Newbery Medal and Honor Books, 1922–Present" Archived October 24, 2011, at the Wayback Machine. Association for Library Service to Children. ALA. Retrieved April 19, 2012.
  72.  "Warsaw Stories" (various reprints beginning with a version of this biography). Eilat Gordin Levitan.

General and cited references

  • Burgess, Anthony (1998), Rencontre au Sommet (in French), Paris: Éd. Mille et une nuits.
  • Richard Burgin. Conversations with Isaac Bashevis Singer. NY: Doubleday, 1985.
  • Carr, Maurice (December 1992), "My Uncle Itzhak: A Memoir of I.B. Singer", Commentary.
  • Lester Goran. The Bright Streets of Surfside: The Memoir of a Friendship with Isaac Bashevis Singer. Kent, OH: Kent State University Press, 1994.
  • Hadda, Janet (1997), Isaac Bashevis Singer: A Life, New York: Oxford University Press.
  • Kresh, Paul (1979), Isaac Bashevis Singer: The Magician of West 86th Street, New York: Dial Press.
  • Roberta Saltzman. Isaac Bashevis Singer: a bibliography of his works in Yiddish and English, 1960–1991. Lanham, MD: Scarecrow Press, 2002. ISBN 0-8108-4315-3
  • Dorothea Straus. Under the Canopy. New York: George Braziller, 1982. ISBN 0-8076-1028-3
  • Florence Noiville. Isaac B. Singer, A Life, Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2006
  • Olidort, Shoshana. "Proverbial Language and Literary Truth in the Work of Isaac Bashevis Singer." Prooftexts 38, no. 3 (2021): 510–531.
  • Telushkin, Dvorah (1997). Master of Dreams: A Memoir of Isaac Bashevis Singer. New York: Morrow.
  • Tree, Stephen (2004), Isaac Bashevis Singer, Munich: DTV Deutscher Taschenbuch, ISBN 978-3423244152.
  • Agata Tuszyńska. Lost Landscapes: In Search of Isaac Bashevis Singer and the Jews of Poland. New York: Morrow, 1998. Hardcover. ISBN 0688122140 via Google Books, preview.
  • Wolitz, Seth L, ed. (2001), The Hidden Isaac Bashevis Singer, Austin: University of Texas Press.
  • Israel Zamir. Journey to My Father, Isaac Bashevis Singer. New York: Arcade 1995.
  • Aleksandra Ziolkowska-Boehm The Roots Are Polish. Toronto: Canadian-Polish Research Institute, 2004. ISBN 0-920517-05-6
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