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.

Palmyra and Zarnof

Watch now:

Arnold Zable—author, human rights activist and son of Yiddish-speaking immigrants—tells the story of hearing a connection between a Syrian refugee's account of Palmyra and the fictional shtetl of Zarnof.

This is an excerpt from an oral history with Arnold Zable.

This excerpt is in English.

Arnold Zable was born in Wellington, New Zealand in 1947.