Jonas Kreppel

Jonas Kreppel (1874–1940) was a multifaceted Austrian-Jewish writer, journalist, and civil servant known for his prolific literary output and high-ranking career in the Austrian government. Born in Drohobycz, Galicia (now Ukraine) with a Hasidic background and Talmudic education and became a self-taught intellectual and polyglot. Authored many books on a wide range of Jewish topics, including the “Yiddish Sherlock Holmes”, a legendary Jewish private eye and “superhero” who defended the Jewish people using intellect and bravery. He was arrested in 1938 following the Nazi annexation of Austria and died in the Buchenwald concentration camp in July, 1940. His pulp fiction stories were widely read in the Yiddish world and notably influenced writers like Nobel laureate Isaac Bashevis Singer. [Google/AI] See Eddy Portnoy’s highly informative review of “Adventures of Max Spitzkopf” in the Jewish Review of Books, Winter 2026.

Kreppel, Jonas. (Adventures of Max Spitzkopf: The Yiddish Sherlock Holmes [pb, White Goat Press, 2025, transl. by Mikhl Yashinsky]) 979-8990998056