Yiddishe dikhterins: antologye

If you randomly open a page of Yiddishe dikhterns: antologye / Yiddish Women Writers: An Anthology you will most likely find someone staring back at you. Each entry in this 400-page anthology is adorned with a tipped in photograph of the author's face, frozen in time - a face that is probably unknown now and, according to the anthologizer Ezra Korman's introduction, mostly unknown at the time of the book's publication in 1928. Published in Chicago by L.M. Stein publishers, this book is itself a forgotten work of art and represents the apex of Yiddish publishing arts in the 20's.

Accompanying the portraits and poetry are exquisite woodcuts by Todros Geller, a Chicago based artist whose illustrations are found in many Yiddish books of the period. Geller's woodcuts announce the distinct sections of the anthology in Yiddish folk-art style.

The front section contains tipped in plates of 17th and 18th century Yiddish poetry written by women. This facsimile of Hannah Katz's poem Tfile l'Shabes / Prayer for the Sabbath, in the style of a petitionary prayer, is one of the earliest examples of women's writing in Yiddish.

• View the entry for Yiddishe dikhterns: antologye / Yiddish Women Writers: An Anthology in our catalog.
• To see if there’s a used copy of Yiddishe dikhterns: antologye / Yiddish Women Writers: An Anthology in Yiddish, contact orders@bikher.org.
• You may also be interested in Found Treasures a collection of prose in English providing a social and historical look at Jewish women's lives during the last century.