Sholem Aleichem

Sholem Aleichem (Solomon Naumovich Rabinovich, 1859–1916) -Sholem Aleichem, the giant of Yiddish literature, typically wrote about pious or struggling “ordinary folk,” but he occasionally explored the darker side of Jewish life through the following works: Moshkeleh the Thief (Moshkele Ganev): This 1903 novella is his most direct exploration of the Jewish underworld. It features a horse thief as its hero and was the first Yiddish work to use authentic “thieves’ argot” (slang). It was notably excluded from his 28-volume collected works for decades, possibly due to its “unrefined” subject matter.

The Bloody Hoax (Der Blutiker Shpas): A novel based on the real-life 1911 Beiliss blood libel case. It deals with legal injustice and false accusations of murder against Jews in the Russian Empire.

The Knife (Dos Messer): A short story that delves into the psychological guilt and fear of a young boy who steals a knife.

Yaknez: An unpublished satire that portrays a world of fraudulent brokers and financial scams in the big city of Yehupetz.

Eternal Life (Oylem Haba): This story touches on petty corruption and the “amoral” behavior of a shtetl when a naive young scholar encounters the Russian police.  [Google/AI]

His portrayal of these “marginal” characters paved the way for later Yiddish writers like Sholem Asch and Isaac Bashevis Singer to write more explicitly about Jewish crime. [Google/AI]

Aleichem, Sholem, (The Bloody Hoax [hc, transl. by Aliza Shevrin, Indiana UP, 1991]) 978-0253304018

Aleichem, Sholem, (Moshkeleh the Thief: A Rediscovered Novel [pb, translated by Curt Leviant, 1903, Jewish Publication Society, 2021] 978-0827615151

Aleichem, Sholem, “The Knife: A Story”, trans. by Eliezer Greenberg and Isaac Rosenfeld, Commentary Magazine, February 1950.

Aleichem, Sholem, “Yaknez”, tr. by Curt Leviant, in Sholom Aleichem, Stories and Satires, [hc, Thomas Yoseloff, 1967], B000E2ZBWG

Aleichem, Sholom, “Eternal Life”, in Howe, Irving & Eliezer Greenberg. (A Treasury of Yiddish Stories) [hc, Viking Adult, revised ed., 1989] 978-067083 0374 [pb, Penguin, 1990] 978-0140144192