The Dance of the Demons
Ebook
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Overview
A semi-autobiographical portrait of the original Yentl and “an important contribution to the vastly neglected genre of feminist Yiddish literature” (Booklist).
In this autobiographical novel—originally published in Yiddish as Der Sheydim Tanz in 1936—Esther Kreitman lovingly depicts a world replete with rabbis, yeshiva students, beggars, farmers, gangsters, seamstresses, and socialists as seen through the eyes of the girl who served as Isaac Bashevis Singer’s inspiration for the story “Yentl, the Yeshiva Boy.”
Barred from the studies at which her idealistic rabbi father and precocious brother excel, Deborah revels in the books she hides behind the kitchen stove, her brief forays outside the household, and her clandestine attraction to a young Warsaw rebel. But her family confines and blunts her dreams, as they navigate the constraints of Jewish life in a world that tolerates, but does not approve, their presence.
Forced into an arranged marriage, Deborah runs away on the eve of World War into a world that would offer more than she ever dreamed . . .
This edition includes memorial pieces by Kreitman’s son and granddaughter.
“A daring feat.” —Library Journal (starred review)
“Above all, the sheer story-telling skill of Kreitman’s prose reminds us how past worlds are evoked through detail, practical reminders of daily lives and customs which no longer exist.” —The Jewish Quarterly
“I do not know of a single woman in Yiddish literature who wrote better than she did.” —Isaac Bashevis Singer
“Kreitman’s writing is clear, marvelously descriptive and occasionally evocative.” —Jewish Book World
“[Kreitman] clearly has the same deep, haunting literary storyteller’s gifts as her siblings.” —Lilith
“A haunting and haunted book.” —The Jewish Reader
- Title: The Dance of the Demons
- Authors: Ilan Stavans, Esther Singer Kreitman, Maurice Carr
- Publisher: The Feminist Press at CUNY
- Print Publication Date: 2019
- Logos Release Date: 2024
- Pages: 328
- Language: English
- Resources: 1
- Format: Digital › Ebook
- ISBNs: 9781558616462, 9781558615953, 1558615954, 1558616462
- Resource ID: LLS:9781558616462
- Resource Type: Monograph
- Metadata Last Updated: 2025-04-21T18:08:23Z
Esther Kreitman (1891-1954) was born in Bilgoray, Poland, and is the sister of renowned Yiddish writers Israel Joshua and Isaac Bashevis Singer. Raised in Warsaw and married in Antwerp, Kreitman and her family fled to London at the start of World War I. She is the author of two novels and a collection of short stories. Essayist, translator, and critic Maurice Carr (also known as Martin Lea) was born Morris Kreitman (1914-2003), son of Esther Singer Kreitman, in Antwerp, Belgium. He is best known for his much-anthologized collection Jewish Short Stories of Today, his translations of his family's writing, and his writing on his mother and uncle, Isaac Bashevis Singer. Ilan Stavans is a professor of Latin American and Latino cultures at Amherst College. From 2001 to 2006, he was the host of the syndicated PBS show Conversations with Ilan Stavans. His edited collections include Isaac Bashevis Singer and The Oxford Book of Jewish Stories. He is the author of On Borrowed Words and Resurrecting Hebrew. Anita Norich is an associate professor of English and Judaic studies at the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor. She teaches, lectures, and publishes on Yiddish language and literature, Jewish-American literature, and Holocaust literature. She is the author of The Homeless Imagination in the Fiction of Israel Joshua Singer.