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The great Yiddish scholar Max Weinreich was delivering a lecture in Finland when the Nazis invaded his native Poland. The lecture saved his life. He made his way to New York, where he opened his doors to new students. Many thought his work with hopeless -- especially since half of the world Yiddish speakers had been killed in the Holocaust. Asked why he persevered, Weinreich answered simply: "Because Yiddish has magic, it will outwit history." And so it has -- though in ways few could have imagined. In 1980, a 23-year-old student named Aaron Lansky set out to rescue the world's abandoned Yiddish books before it was too late. Precious volumes that had survived Hitler and Stalin were being passed down from older generations of Jewish immigrants to their non-Yiddish-speaking children -- only to be thrown away or destroyed. With little more than his own chutzpah, Lansky issued a worldwide appeal for unwanted Yiddish books, and the response was overwhelming. Outwitting History is an adventure tale filled with unforgettable characters and told with the exuberance of a man whose passion led him from house to house, country to country, collecting treasured books and heartfelt, often hilarious stories of the vibrant intellectual world these older Jews inhabited. Lansky and a team of young volunteers crisscrossed America, shlepping books from attics and basements, demolition sites and dumpsters, while schmoozing with their owners, who insisted on feeding them a little nosh -- gefilte fish, kasha, blintzes, latkes, kugel -- before handing over, one book at a time, their beloved literary heritage. When Lansky started out, experts believed that fewer than 70,000 Yiddish-language books still existed. 25 years and 1.5 million books later, the organization Lansky founded, the National Yiddish Book Center, is one of the largest and fastest-growing Jewish cultural groups in the world. As he takes us along on his groundbreaking journey, Lansky explores the roots of the Yiddish language and introduces us to the brilliant Yiddish writers -- from Mendele to Sholem Aleichem to I.B. Singer -- whose lasting cultural relevance is evident on every page. He shares the humor, tenacity, and love for the written word that unites Jewish immigrants with everyone who cares about the future of great literature. And he enables us to see how an almost-lost culture is the bridge between the old world and the future. - Jacket flap.
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Previews available in: English
Subjects
Yiddish imprints, Yiddish language, Contributions in Yiddish language, Revival, National Yiddish Book Center (U.S.), Language revival, Book collecting, History, Et le yiddish, Yiddish (Langue), Histoire, Imprimés yiddish, Langage et langues, Bibliophilie, National Yiddish Book Center (É.-U.), RenouveauPeople
Aaron Lansky (1955-)Edition | Availability |
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Outwitting History: The Amazing Adventures of a Man Who Rescued a Million Yiddish Books
November 2006, Recorded Books
Audio cassette
in English
141934949X 9781419349492
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Outwitting History: The Amazing Adventures of a Man Who Rescued a Million Yiddish Books
September 2, 2005, Algonquin Books
Paperback
in English
1565125134 9781565125131
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Outwitting history: the amazing adventures of a man who rescued a million Yiddish books
2004, RB Large Print
in English
1419322559 9781419322556
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5
Outwitting history: the amazing adventures of a man who rescued a million Yiddish books
2004, Algonquin Books of Chapel Hill, Algonquin Books
Hardcover
in English
- 1st ed.
1565124294 9781565124295
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- Created April 30, 2008
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June 17, 2024 | Edited by ImportBot | import existing book |
August 17, 2010 | Edited by IdentifierBot | added LibraryThing ID |
April 24, 2010 | Edited by Open Library Bot | Fixed duplicate goodreads IDs. |
April 16, 2010 | Edited by bgimpertBot | Added goodreads ID. |
April 30, 2008 | Created by an anonymous user | Imported from amazon.com record |