Empathy with the devil: Isaac Bashevis Singer and the deadly pleasures of misogyny

From: Novel | Date: July 1, 1998| Author: | Copyright information

I begin with two quotations from Isaac Bashevis Singer's autobiographical memoir, In My Father's Court (1966). The first concerns a dark stairwell to the family's first apartment in the Warsaw ghetto:

The staircase was another plague because certain children preferred it to the outhouse. Worse still, there were women who used it as a garbage dump. The janitor, who was supposed to light lamps along the staircase, seldom did so, and when he did, we were deprived of them by ten-thirty. The tiny, smoke-stained lamps gave so little light that the darkness seemed to thicken around them. When I ...

Read all of this article with a FREE trial to HighBeam Research

Related newspaper, magazine, and trade journal articles from HighBeam Research

(Including press releases, facts, information, and biographies)

THE MAN OF MASKS - A biography of Polish writer I.B. Singer, secretive, conflicted interpreter of Jewish life
; BOOK REVIEW Isaac B. Singer: A Life By Florence Noiville Translated, from...recipient and fiction writer Isaac Bashevis Singer. Born in Poland in 1904, the son and grandson of Hasidic rabbis, Singer lived in various Polish communities until...
Poised between the ancient and the new.(Isaac B. Singer: A Life)(Book review)
; ISAAC B. SINGER: A Life. By Florence Noiville, translated...Straus & Giroux, $23 Isaac Bashevis Singer, the last great Yiddish writer, used a...into a poor, austere family in which, Singer later said, the eternal questions were...
My Favorite Demon; In Singer's Work, Imps, Dybbuks and Evil Spirits Get the Last Word
; ...the savage pain of a rotten youth. Isaac Bashevis Singer was no exception, except that his demons were demons...kabbalists erode over time into the apotropaism of Singer's chasidic forebears. Singer well knew that to draw demons from chasidic traditions...
Singer's science Pop music a serious endeavor for Chicago songwriter.(Time Out!)
; ...Guarino Daily Herald Music Critic David Singer is not just for kids anymore. That's the...City Soundtrack and others. These days, Singer is hooked up with Engine Studios, the...midst of starting an Internet label, and Singer is their first signing. Deep Elm has a...
County official to head to Iraq: Singer leaves for training in N.C. at end of this month.
; ...Laura McCandlish May 13--Maj. Edwin F. Ed Singer III, director of the Carroll County Health...reconstruction team in Afghanistan in July 2005, Singer has become accustomed to setting his civilian...in a combat zone. What is most trying, Singer said, is leaving his family behind, forcing...
Rethinking Peter Singer
; Rethinking Peter Singer Gordon Preece, Editor Downers Grove...0-8308-2682-3; 180 pages, paperback, $18.00 Peter Singer is the bete noire of contemporary ethics...moral values. It is safe to say that Singer takes what readers of this journal would...
Lethal prescriptions: Peter Singer's flawed Ethics.
; ...Ethics and featured a profile of Peter Singer, who holds the university's Ira W. DeCamp...According to the students interviewed, Singer has challenged them to question conventional...euthanasia for adults. The article described Singer as by an order of magnitude the most famous...
Is Singer testing the waters? // Says he seeks a 4th candidate for mayor
; William S. Singer, an unsuccessful Democratic candidate...Washington, Jane Byrne and Eddie Vrdolyak," Singer said of three likely candidates. "Chicago...why he felt none of the three would do, Singer said, "I won't answer that unless I'm...
Sewing Giant Singer Files to Reorganize
; Singer Co. NV, the world's largest manufacturer of sewing machines...reorganize its troubled operations. In a statement late Sunday, Singer blamed a decline in the international sewing market and last week's bankruptcy filing by a German subsidiary. Singer's retail and production businesses will continue ...
Searching for Singer
; ...Post 10-06-2006 Headline: Searching for Singer Byline: ELAINE MARGOLIN Edition; Up Front...29 Friday, October 6, 2006 -- ISAAC B. SINGER: A Life By Florence Noiville, translated...224 pages $23 I've met Isaac Bashevis Singer. Not the Nobel Prize- winning master of...