Bread Givers
Editorial Reviews
From 500 Great Books by Women; review by Jesse Larsen
Conscious of her outsider status - a Polish immigrant, a writer in a foreign language, a Jewish female - Anzia Yezierska takes us inside an early twentieth-century American immigrant Jewish family, a family without a son to lighten their load or brighten their lives. Sarah, the narrator of Bread Givers, describes with urgency and in detail the lives she, her sisters, and her mother live to support their revered, torah-reading father: their crowded shared rooms so he can study undisturbed; the numerous jobs all but he work to maintain the family and support his books, charities, and manner of dress; his constant and often impossible demands. Sarah struggles to remain loyal: "I began to feel I was different than my sisters... If they ever had times they hated Father, they were too frightened of themselves to confess... But could I help it what was inside me? I had to feel what I felt even it killed me." Through profuse and perceptive dialogue, Anzia Yezierska brings to life a heritage whose strength, wisdom, and idiom continue, seventy years later, to enrich North American culture and language. -- For great reviews of books for girls, check out Let's Hear It for the Girls: 375 Great Books for Readers 2-14.
Irving Howe
One of the authentic and touching testaments of the struggle of Jewish immigrants, especially Jewish women, to find their way in the new world.
Bread Givers
Bread Givers,Anzia Yezierska,Alice Kessler-Harris,Persea Books,0892550147,20th Century American Novel And Short Story,Assimilation (Sociology),Children of immigrants,Fathers and daughters,Fiction,Fiction - General,General,Jewish American Novel And Short Story,Lower East Side (New York, N.Y,Modern fiction,USA
Book Updates:
Recommended Books