Jacob Isaac Segal: A Montreal Yiddish Poet and His Milieu(Canadian Studies)

Table of Contents:
Translator’s Note Preface: A Quebec Lyric Poet Introduction  CHAPTER 1 Arrival in Montreal Factory Work First Attempts at Writing In the Pages of Jewish Daily Eagle The Revelation of 1917 The Emergence of Yiddish Literature in Montreal Caiserman in Montreal The Poale Zion and the Founding of the Canadian Jewish Congress The Urgent Call of Zionism The Failed Russian Revolution of 1905 The Beginnings of a Jewish Proletariat in Montreal CHAPTER 2 Leaving Korets The Dawn of 1918 Intimist Writing The Urban Aesthetic The Canadian Winter An Exemplary Influence  The Genesis of a Yiddish Poet The Korets Talmud Torah and Its Nigun First Literary Influences Segal’s Maternal Grandfather The Great Crossing CHAPTER 3 First Literary Success Bazunder lider (1921) The New York Modernist Movement The Journal Nyuansn Under the Wing of Mani Leib Fun mayn shtub un mayn velt (1923)  Lider (1926) Caiserman, the First Yiddish Literary Critic The Canadian Landscape Following the Lead of the French-Canadian Poets An Emerging Literature CHAPTER 4 Toward a Golden Age New Waves of Immigration The Crash of 1929 Literary Salons and Book Committees The Sinister Echoes of Nazism Idishe dikhter in kanade (1934) Caiserman as Literary Historian The Poet at His Peak The Great Mystical Watershed The Agnostic Poet Before God CHAPTER 5 The “Years of Lead”: The Holocaust and Its Aftermath First Indications of Genocide The End of a World New Sources of Inspiration Looking Toward Montreal A Mystical Leap A Chorus of Praise The Contribution of the Holocaust Survivors The Ravitch Galaxy The Yiddish Writers Association Twilight Reflections The Final Exile Conclusion

About the Author :
Full professor in the Department of History at the University of Ottawa where he teaches contemporary Canadian history. With a background in modern history, modern languages and literature (French, Russian) and law, Vivian Felsen is a long-time translator of both French and Yiddish into English. Her published translations include books on Canadian Jewish history, Holocaust memoirs, and Yiddish short stories by women writers. Her involvement in Canadian Jewish Studies began with the translation of two books by her grandfather, Montreal Yiddish journalist Israel Medres. For the first translation, Montreal of Yesterday: Jewish Life in Montreal, 1900–1920, she won a Canadian Jewish Book Award in 2001 for Yiddish translation, and for the second, Between the Wars: Canadian Jews in Transition, she was the recipient of a J. I. Segal Award for the best translation of a book on a Jewish theme (in 2004). For her most recently published translation, J. I. Segal (1896–1954): A Montreal Yiddish Poet and His Milieu (2017) she has just been named a Finalist for the 2018 Governor General’s Award in Translation (French into English). Some of the many poems by Segal, which she translated from Yiddish into English for that book, will appear in the forthcoming issue of the journal Canadian Jewish Studies. Among the several Holocaust memoirs which she has translated is Le Soleil voilé, Auschwitz 1942–1945 by Paul Schaffer. Her English version, published in 2015 as The Veiled Sun: From Auschwitz to New Beginning, includes a uniquely personal introduction to the original French edition by the late Simone Veil. The Veil of Tears (2016), her translation of the 1944 memoir Fun natsishen yomertol by Rabbi Pinchas Hirschprung, won a gold medal in the autobiography/memoir category of the 2018 Independent Publisher Book Awards, and has just earned her the 2018 J. I. Segal Award for translation of a book on a Jewish theme. Vivian Felsen’s translations from the Yiddish of short stories by women writers have appeared in print, most notably in The Exile Book of Yiddish Women Writers (ed. Frieda Johles Forman), which received a Canadian Jewish Book Award in 2014. Over the years, she has made presentations related to Yiddish and Yiddish translation to various groups and organizations, as well as at academic conferences in Canada, the U.S., and Poland. She was a contributor to New Readings of Yiddish Montreal — Traduire le Montréal yiddish (eds. Pierre Anctil, Norman Ravvin, Sherry Simon; 2007), and her essay on Canadian Yiddish literature will be published in Kanade, di Goldene Medine? Perspectives on Canadian-Jewish Literature and Culture / Perspectives sur la littérature et la culture juives canadiennes (eds: Krzysztof Majer, Justyna Fruzińska, Józef Kwaterko and Norman Ravvin), scheduled to appear in November of 2018. Vivian Felsen is also a visual artist who has regularly exhibited her paintings in Toronto for over forty years.

Review :
A beautifully written and researched book abounding in grace, nuance and depth. As Canada’s most renowned Yiddish poet and a celebrated figure in Jewish letters, a full-length study of J.I. Segal is long overdue…. This is the first monograph to appear that focuses specifically on Segal. … A significant contribution to our knowledge of Segal’s life and writing… the extensive primary source material offered by this encyclopedic work will be of great value to those who seek to undertake a scholarly analysis that situates Segal within the wider context of Yiddish letters in Canada as well as internationally. "première étude systématique de ce poète célébré partout dans le monde yiddish au cours des années 1930 (Vienne, Varsovie, New York, Buenos Aires), mais qui est demeuré peu connu au Canada français (et anglais). (…) le livre d’Anctil représente beaucoup plus qu’un ouvrage sur Segal puisque les lecteurs y puisent de l’information sur l’histoire et le milieu de provenance des Juifs, y compris la situation sociopolitique en Russie et dans les pays avoisinants. … quelque cent pages d’annexes viennent compléter l’imposant ouvrage, accompagné d’une bibliographie contenant, entre autres, les poèmes de Segal cités dans les chapitres, des articles par et sur l’auteur ainsi que quelques correspondances." "According to Anctil Segal was the first poet in Quebec to embrace modern urbanity in his work. Consequently, he choses to focus on Segal’s Montréalité, both the lens through which the poet’s modernity is reflected and the repository of longing for the idealized innocence of the shietl. However, Segal also ‘appropriates’ Montreal by Yiddishizing it…This book is sure to resonate deeply with readers partly because the fragile memory of Segal, the reverred forgotten poet, is reminiscent of the fate of Yiddish culture itself….This intimate, compelling and scholarly collective portrait is essential for anyone interested in the inner life of the Jewish community, and in the immigrant experience in Montreal." L'essai de Pierre Anctil est davantage qu'une biographie passionnée et passionnante. … À travers Segal, c'est toute la communauté juive est-européenne qui arrive massivement à Montréal qui est dépeinte, avec ses circulations mondiales, tant les liens sont nombreux avec les conjonctures européenne, nord-américaine et québécoise. La grande force de cet essai est de renouveler l'histoire du pluralisme québécois.  Published by the University of Ottawa Press last year, Felsen's translation has been hailed as a 'brilliant' and 'sensitive' rendering of Anctil's original work (...).