In one of the two Bilgoraj yizkhor bikher (memorial books)[1] we read in a chapter entitled “Writers and Artists from Bilgoray”: “The famous prose writer born in Bilgoraj is Israel Joshua Singer (Singer’s brother is a talented writer who signs his works with the name Bashevis and he lives in America).”[2] Further in the article we find more detailed information about I.J. Singer and no more mention about Bashevis.
Similar quotations can be easily found even in much later publications when Isaac Bashevis Singer, the younger brother, had already achieved fame. There are numerous statements by Yiddish critics that Bashevis’s fame will pass away while Israel Joshua’s work will retains its status in world literature. For instance Sol Liptzin states in his history of Yiddish literature: “Bashevis abuses his literary talent by straining far too often for sensational effects, by indulging in exaggerations, by emphasizing sadistic aspects. Instead of a balanced view of Jewish life, he offers a distorted, demonic view. Though his fame in the 1960’s and 1970’s exceeded that of any Jewish novelist since Sholem Asch, it was not likely to be as enduring as that of his older brother, I.J. Singer, whose novels presented a sounder insight into Polish-Jewish reality before its extinction.” [3].
Liptzin must have had in mind the perspective of Yiddish critics as in the English speaking world the elder Singer was forgotten surprisingly fast. Already in 1966 Irving Howe entitled his review of the new American edition of Yoshe Kalb “The Other Singer”. Well read both in Yiddish and American literature, Howe stresses “the notorious instability of literary taste” and describes the younger Singer’s eager audience as “a public composed of third generation of semi-assimilated Jews, as well as some gentile fellow-travellers, whose nostalgia or curiosity about Jewishness is decidedly limited but who find in the author of Satan in Goray and The Magician of Lublin a congenial voice. He brings together esoteric Judaica which requires no commitment from the reader, and a sophisticated modern tone, which allows for immediate recognition; and this mixture speaks to highbrow readers as no other Yiddish writer and few American writers, can.”[4] Nevertheless Howe concluded his description with a suggestion that Bashevis was not quite the “swinger”, not quite the delightfully abrasive modern voice they suppose him to be.
Since that time a good number of books and hundreds of articles on Isaac Bashevis Singer have been published in English as well as in other languages. They differ in character from academic studies, biographies, monographs and collections of essays to works of general nature, or those focusing on specific aspects of his fiction. Many are limited in their scope to addressing the writer’s works translated into English and offer a reading of his fiction in the context of European and/or American literature. There are also studies by scholars who to a lesser or greater degree make use of the Yiddish originals, but they usually also concentrate on the texts translated into English, assuming that the best of Bashevis’s oeuvre was translated and published in English; the critics realize that by doing this they will undoubtedly reach a wider group of readers.
What image do various readers and critics project about Isaac Bashevis Singer? As those familiar with his work know quite well, fairly contradictory perceptions of the writer in readers’ popular consciousness are in existence: A kind-hearted visitor from the Old World feeding pigeons on the Upper West Side and creating moving stories of a world that is no more; a miser, cold and ruthless towards his relatives, suffering from a writing mania that resulted in both masterpieces and kitsch; the author who patiently waited until they would discover him in the United States, and then in the world; a conformist flattering the American audience and adapting his fiction to their unrefined taste; a writer presenting two different personas depending on whether he addressed his Yiddish or English readers.[5] He has been perceived quite differently by Yiddish and English readers and critics, not to mention generational differences. To this we can add diverse modes of reception in various countries, especially in Israel and Poland where he has been treated with special interest for, among others, historical and political reasons. We can ask while comparing him to other writers a more formal question concerning his national and cultural affiliation and a purely evaluative one concerning the quality of his work.
___________________
[1] There are two memorial books devoted to the Jewish community of Bilgoraj: Moshe Teytlbojm, Bilgoray yizkor-bukh, Jerusalem 1955 and Khurbn Bilgoraj, ed. by Avrum Kronenberg, Tel Aviv 1956.
[2] “Bilgorayer shreyber un kinstler”, in: Teytlboym, p. 65.
[3] Sol Liptzin, A History of Yiddish Literature, Jonathan David Publishers, Inc., Middle Village, New York 1985, p. 272.
[4] Irving Howe, “The Other Singer”, Commentary, 3, 1966, p. 78.
[5] On the writer “fooling” his interlocutors see David G. Roskies, “The Fibs of I.B. Singer” , Forward, December 18, 1992, p. 1. |
1 
