Tevye the Dairyman, by Sholem Alaichem
  SHOLEM ALAICHEM Pseudonym of Solomon Rabinowitz (also spelled "Shalom" and "Sholem" that is a traditional Hebrew and Yiddish greeting and means "peace be with you"). Yiddish short-story writer, dramatist, and humorist. Recognized as a best Jewish writer who ever lived in Russia and wrote in Yiddish. Regarded as one of the most creative writers in Yiddish. Famous for his sad and ironical novels and stories that describe the life of simple Russian Jews in small towns.
Born in Pereyaslav (now Pereyaslav-Khmel'nitsky), near Kiev, Ukraine. Worked as a teacher and rabbi. In 1905 fled Jewish persecution in Russia and in 1914 settled in New York City.
Most important works include "Stempenyu" (translated in English in 1913), "Inside Kasrilovka" (1938), "The Old Country" (1946), "Tevye's Daughters" (1949), and "Adventures of Mottel, The Cantor's Son" (1953). Most known characters are Menachem Mendel, the typical small-town Jew; the eternal dreamer and schemer (Luftmensch); and the best loved, Tobias the Dairyman (Tevye der Milchiger), an indestructible optimist. A well-known musical comedy "Fiddler on the Roof" (1964) is based on Sholem Alaichem's stories about Tevye.
Of all the characters in modern Jewish fiction, the most beloved is Tevye, the compassionate, irrepressible, Bible-quoting dairyman from Anatevka, who has been immortalized in the writings of Sholem Aleichem and in acclaimed and award-winning theatrical and film adaptations.

And no Yiddish writer was more beloved than Tevye's creator, Sholem Rabinovich (1859-1916), the "Jewish Mark Twain," who wrote under the pen name of Sholem Alaichem. Beautifully translated by Hillel Halkin, here is Sholem Alaichem's heartwarming and poignant account of Tevye and his daughters, together with the "Railroad Stories," twenty-one tales that examine human nature and modernity as they are perceived by men and women riding the trains from shtetl to shtetl.

Reviews of Tevye the Dairyman Include:

"With his supple, intelligent translation, Halkin makes accessible the poignant short stories by the legendary Yiddish humorist Sholem Rabinovich (18591916), who wrote under the nom de plume ``Sholem Aleichem,'' a Yiddish salutation. As Halkin elucidates in his introduction, Tevye's self-mocking but deeply affecting monologues (which inspired the play and film Fiddler on the Roof satisfy on several levels: as a psychological analysis of a father's love for his daughters, despite the disappointments they bring him; as a paradigm of the tribulations and resilience of Russian Jewry and the disintegration of shtetl life at the twilight of the Czarist Empire; and as a Job-like theological debate with God. The 20 Railroad Storiesthe monologues of a traveling salesman and his fellow Jewish travelersdepict Jewish thieves and arsonists, feuding spouses, draft evaders, grieving parents and assimilationists. Like the eight Tevye tales, these unprettified stories of simple people and their harsh realities summon a bygone era, but their appeal and application are timeless. Bringing both groups of tales together for the first time in English, this first volume in Schocken's Library of Yiddish Classics series is an auspicious event." Publisher's Weekly (July)

"This fresh translation is likely to serve as the indispensable Sholem Aleichem for some time to come." -Cynthia Ozick

"The editor and translator have done brilliantly." -Saul Bellow

"A body of work that is very much alive and that continues to dazzle us with its brilliance, wit, and humanity." -Leonard Nimoy

Film Adaptation:

Long before "Fiddler On the Roof," renowned Yiddish stage actor Maurice Schwartz brought Sholem Aleichem's beloved tales of Tevye the Dairyman to the screen in this classic drama. Shot on a farm in Jericho, Long Island, Schwartz's film centers on the conflict caused by the marriage of Tevye's daughter Khave to a non-Jewish Ukrainian intellectual. This is the definitive, restored edition of one of the greatest milestones in Yiddish cinema.

The Musical:

Fiddler on the Roof was one of the great stage and film musicals. With music by Jerry Bock, lyrics by Sheldon Harnick, and book by Joseph Stein, it opened on Broadway in 1964, with Zero Mostel in the leading role, that of Tevye the milkman. The role was later taken on stage, in both the USA and UK, by Chaim Topol, who made the part his own and played it in the successful 1971 film adaptation by Norman Jewison.

Reviews:

Herald

Reading Group Discussion Guide:

1. When Tevye interpolates his own running commentary on his prayers as he is running after his horse, is Sholem Aleichem making fun of Tevye's faith or showing its power?

2. Do you enjoy Tevye's art of quotation, or do you share his wife Golda's impatience with it?

3. Tevye is often mistaken for a "typical" East European Jew, and yet he is utterly atypical: Most Jews lived in towns or cities, he is the only Jew in his village. Most Jews dealt in commerce or small crafts and industry, he is a dairy farmer. Most Jews prayed with a minyan every day, he does so only on his parents' anniversaries, twice a year. Why, then, do you think he is considered typical?

4. How would you contrast and compare Tevye with his wife's relative Menahem Mendl? They are both "optimistic" by nature, but are they altogether alike in their enthusiasm?

5. The daughters represent escalating challenges to their father and to his way of life. What are these challenges? How does Tevye respond to each?

6. When the Tevye stories were turned into drama and film, the greatest variations of interpretation involved the character of Chvedka and the priest. Some directors painted them very black, others tried to make them friendly - especially Chvedka, whom Fiddler on the Roof turned into a hero. How does Sholem Aleichem treat them in his original story?

7. How come Tevye gets along so well with the rich Jew in the first episode, and so badly in the episodes of Shprintse and Beilka?

Other Titles by Sholem Alaichem:

The Letters of Menahem-Mendl and Sheyne-Sheyndl and Motl, the Cantor's Son, 2002
Adventures of Mottel, 1999
Happy New Year and Other Stories, 2000
My First Love Affair and Other Stories, 2002
Holiday Tales, 2003
Nineteen to the Dozen, 2000
The Further Adventures of Menahem-Mendl, 2001
Best of Sholem Alaichem, 1989
Treasury of Sholem Alaichem, 1996
The Adventures of Menahem-Mendl, 1969
Tevye's Daughter, 1999
The Bewitched Tailor, 1999
Stories and Satires, 1999
Old Country Tales, 1999
Motl, Pesi Dem Hasin, 2000
The Great Fair, 2000
From the Home to America, 2001
In American, 2001
Bloody Hoax, 1991
Favorite Tales of Sholem Alaichem

Links:

Sholem Aleichem Network
Sholem Aleichem (1859-1916)

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