At the Edge of Dreamland

By Tsvi Eisenman

Translated by Barnett Zumoff

Format: Hardcover

ISBN:

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Tsvi Eisenman is a member of the last generation of Yiddish writers to have been nurtured in Eastern Europe in an environment of living, burgeoning, highly productive Yiddish culture. He is distinguished from all the others in that group by his beautifully crafted, highly imaginative, and profoundly affecting short stories, many of which depict allegorical creatures and events that reflect weltschmerz and pessimism. Though the stories can be read as beautiful literature in their own right, they can be even better appreciated if the reader is aware of their references to the Jewish fate"they are informed by and saturated with the overwhelming event of Eisenman's early years, the Holocaust, and by the displacements and wanderings he underwent as a result. Even when a story of his is not directly about the Holocaust, one can sense in it a pervasive sadness derived from that catastrophe.
It is no exaggeration to say that Eisenman's short stories deserve to be ranked alongside those of such masters of that genre as O.Henry, Saki, and Guy de Maupassant, though the latter are better known due to the fact that they wrote in widely read languages, English and French, rather than Yiddish, which is restricted to a diminishingly narrow audience. Eisenman's tales share with theirs the unexpected events and the ironic twists that have made them justly famous. His particular genius is in the brilliant conceptualization and the beautiful language that makes his stories magical and haunting and lifts them into the company of the great literary masters. The purpose of this translation of Eisenman's work is to make his tales accessible to an audience that cannot read Yiddish so that they too can enjoy the beauty of his creations.
About the translator
Barnett Zumoff is an internationally renowned teacher and researcher in the field of Endocrinology, who has published 250 papers in that field. He was, for 13 years, President of the Forward Association, which publishes the Yiddish Forverts and the English Forward, and is currently its Vice-President. He has been and continues to be a prolific translator of Yiddish literature and has published 14 volumes of translations.