Of Lodz and Love

In Of Lodz and Love, Chava Rosenfarb revisits her themes of the shtetl and pre-Holocaust Poland, of economic and political oppression, and of the upheavals that would herald a new Jewish national and political awakening. The story takes Yacov, son of Hindele, and Binele, the daughter of the chalk vendor Yossele Abedale, to the industrial town of Lodz during the first years of Poland’s independence, both before and after the country entered the war with the Bolsheviks.

The would-be young lovers evolve separately against the backdrop of the city’s own struggle for economic survival. In sometimes tragic turns, they make their way in the strange urban culture, rapidly acquiring the skills to survive. Translated from the original Yiddish, this book serves as prologue and as counterpoint to the urbanization of Jewish life in Poland. In its elegance and subtle wit, and overwhelming human dignity, it is not only the testimony of a vanished world, but a powerful love story.

Chava Rosenfarb was born in Lódz, Poland. She was a survivor of the Lódz Ghetto as well as the Auschwitz and Bergen-Belsen concentration camps. She was the recipient of numerous literary prizes. In 1979, she was awarded the Manger Prize--the highest award for Yiddish literature--for her trilogy Tree of Life (Der boim fun leib).