Best Selling Books by Isaac Bashevis Singer

A delightful sequel to a cherished autobiographical collection by the Nobel Laureate In My Father''s Court is one of Isaac Bashevis Singer''s most affecting autobiographical works. The stories in it, published serially in the Jewish Daily Forward, depict the beth din in his father''s home on Krochmalna Street in Warsaw. A unique institution, the beth din was a combined court of law, synagogue, scholarly institution, and psychologist''s office where people sought out the advice and counsel of a neighborhood rabbi. The thirty-one stories gathered here, none previously published in English, show this world as it appeared to a young boy: In "A Guest in the Prayerhouse," a man who has converted to Judaism embarrasses the community with his extreme piety; in "She Will Surely Be Ashamed," a couple come for a divorce after forty years of marriage even though they are still in love; in the extraordinary "He Begs Forgiveness," a jeweler apologizes to his former fiancée for abandoning her twelve years before, igniting the imagination of the young Singer, who dreams of writing stories about dark, eternal love. From the earthy to the ethereal, these stories provide an intimate and powerful evocation of a world.

"Yasha the magician - sword swallower, fire eater, acrobat and master of escape - is famed for his extraordinary Houdini-like skills. Half Jewish, half Gentile, a free thinker who slips easily between worlds, Yasha has an observant wife, a loyal assistant who travels with him and a woman in every town. Now, though, his exploits are catching up with him, and he is tempted to make one final escape - from his marriage, his homeland and the last tendrils of his father''s religion."--Back cover.

Herman Broder, a refugee and Holocaust survivor, has three women in his life: Yadwiga, the loyal Polish peasant who hid him in a hayloft from the Nazis; Masha, his beautiful and neurotic true love; and Tamara, his first wife. Unsure of who he really is, what he wants and whether he can ever find peace, Herman navigates a crowded, Yiddish New York with a sense of paranoia and impending doom. Published in 1972, Enemies, A Love Story is an astonishing novel that blends humour and pathos to create a rich, humane portrayal of a man who cannot escape his past. ''One is forever suspended between laughter and tears by this rich and marvellous novel.'' The New York Times ''Isaac Bashevis Singer is a rare pleasure . . . a literary genius.'' San Francisco Chronicle Winner of the Nobel Prize for Literature

A Warsaw family, from the turn of the century until the German invasion in 1939.

As messianic zeal sweeps through medieval Poland, the Jews of Goray divide between those who, like the Rabbi, insist that no one can "force the end" and those who follow the messianic pretender Sabbatai Zevi. But as hysteria and depravity increase, it becomes clear that it is not the Messiah who has come to Goray.

In his classic followup to his debut story collection, Gimpel the Fool and Other Stories, Isaac Bashevis Singer continues to introduce readers to his unique brand of fiction in eleven unforgettable stories. Praise: "The most brilliant living representative of the Yiddish language in prose and one of the important contemporary writers in America." - The New York Times Review of Books "There is a very old, durable and sage glow to these stories." - Kirkus "Sparkling and triumphant, Isaac Bashevis Singer''s stories are filled with wonder, gratitude, humor, irony and a wry eroticism that manages to exalt the pleasures of the flesh and the soul at the same time." - The Washington Post Book World

On the eighth night of Hanukkah, a family rescues a Yiddish-speaking, dreidel-playing parakeet.

Seven tales which had their beginnings in middle-European Jewish life.

"Noah was a righteous man," says Isaac Bashevis Singer, so he and his family were to be saved from the flood. But rumor had it that only the best of all living creatures were to be taken aboard the Ark with Noah. In a fresh and lively approach to the age-old account, Isaac Bashevis Singer sets down the dialogue of the animals as they vie with one another for a place on the Ark.

Nineteen autobiographical stories about the author''s childhood in Poland from 1908 to 1918.

This book presents a selection of short stories, of which about one third of these stories are about immigrants in the United States. Singer writes about a variety of characters including a professor of history, a coal-heaver, a Bohemian writer, a rich widow oand a chimney sweep. All these characters seem to tread a precarious path between the supernatural world and the inviting pit of material reality.

Slægtsroman.