The Yiddish Book Center's

Wexler Oral History Project

A growing collection of in-depth interviews with people of all ages and backgrounds, whose stories about the legacy and changing nature of Yiddish language and culture offer a rich and complex chronicle of Jewish identity.

Coming to America: A Labor Zionist's Perspective

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Israel Zamir, son of Nobel Laureate Isaac Bashevis Singer, speaks to his impressions of America during his stay there from 1966-1969.

This is an excerpt from an oral history with Israel Zamir.

This excerpt is in English.

Israel Zamir was born in Warsaw, Poland in 1929. Israel died in 2014.

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This interview is part of the Beyond the Books: Yiddish writers and their descendants series.

Other video highlights from this oral history

The Ice Cream Incident: Israel Zamir Remembers Antisemitism in Warsaw

2 min 9 sec

Childhood and Abandonment

4 min 4 sec

The Brothers Singer

5 min 46 sec

Israel Zamir Recalls Living in the Soviet Union

7 min 8 sec

Saying Kaddish For I.J. Singer

3 min 56 sec

"He Meant Nothing To Me”: Israel Zamir Reflects On 20 Years Apart from His Father, Isaac Bashevis Singer

4 min 15 sec

Family Reunion: Meeting His Father, Isaac Bashevis Singer, After Twenty Years of Separation

7 min 7 sec

Breaking Down Walls: Overcoming the Distance Between My Father Bashevis Singer and Me

5 min 18 sec

"He Was In Love With Mr. Isaac Bashevis Singer”: Israel Zamir Describes His Father

1 min 33 sec

A Process of Re-Writing: On Isaac Bashevis Singer’s Process of Translation

2 min 7 sec

Israel Zamir Recalls Attending His Father Isaac Bashevis Singer’s Nobel Prize Ceremony

8 min 52 sec

Having Bashevis as a Father

1 min 46 sec

More information about this oral history excerpt

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