Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Dedication
- Editors and Advisers
- Contents
- Polin
- Statement From the Editors
- ARTICLES
- DOCUMENTS
- INTERVIEW
- A DIALOGUE
- BIBLIOGRAPHICAL ESSAYS
- BOOK REVIEWS
- Norman Davies Heart of Europe. A Short History of Poland
- Linda Gordon Cossack Rebellions. Social Turmoil in the Sixteenth Century Ukraine
- Edward C. Thaden Russia's Western Borderlands, 1710–7870
- Raymond Pearson. National Minorities in Eastern Europe, 1848-1945; S. M. Horak et al Eastern European. National Minorities, 1979-1980
- Jerzy Tomaszewski Rzeczpospolita wielu narodów (A Republic of Many Nations)
- Henry Rollet La Pologne au XX’ siècle
- Jacob Goldberg (ed) Jewish Privileges in the Polish Commonwealth. Charters of Rights Granted to Jewish Communities in Poland-Lithuania in the Sixteenth to Eighteenth Centuries
- Jacob Goldberg (ed) Jewish Privileges in the Polish Commonwealth. Charters of Rights Granted to Jewish Communities in Poland-Lithuania in the Sixteenth to Eighteenth Centuries
- Maurycy Horn (ed) Regesty dokumentów i ekscerpty z Metryki Koronnej do Historii, (Żydów w Polsee 1697-1795. T. I: Czasy saskie (1697-1763); T. IL· Rzlądy Stanisiława Augusta (1764-1795), Część I: (1764-1779) (Summaries of Records and Excerpts of the Crown Registry Relating to the History of Jews in Poland, 1697-1795. Vol. I; The Saxon Era [1697-1763]; Vol. II: The Reign of Stanislaw August [1764'-95], Part I, 1764-79)
- Chone Shmeruk The Esterke Story in riddish and Polish Literature. A Case Study in the Mutual Relations of Two Cultural Traditions
- David Darshan Shir HaMa ‘alot L ‘David and Ktav Hitnazzelut L ‘Darshanim. Translated and Annotated by H. G. Perelmuter
- Raphael Mahler Hasidism and the Jewish Enlightenment. Translated from the Yiddish Eugene Orenstein. Translated from the Hebrew by Aaron Klein Jenny Machlowitz Klein
- Michael Stanislawski Tsar Nicholas I and the Jews: The Transformation of Jewish Society in Russia 1825-1855
- O. O. Gruzenberg Yesterday: Memoirs of a Russian-Jewish Lawyerby Don C.|Rawson
- David Berger (ed) The Legacy of Jewish Migration: 1881 and Its Impact
- Steven E. Aschheim Brothers and Strangers. The East European Jew in German and German Jewish Consciousness, 1800-1923
- A vigdor Dagan, Gertrude Hirschler and Lewis Weiner (eds) The Jews of Czechoslovakia. Historical Studies and Surveys
- Ferdinand Seibt (ed) Die Juden in den bohmischen Liindern. Vortriige der Tagung des Collegium Carolinum in Bad Wiessee
- Ezra Mendelsohn The Jews of East Central Europe Between the World Wars
- Joseph Marcus Social and Political History of the Jews in Poland, 1919-1939
- Shlomo Netzer Ma'avak rehudei Polin al Zekhuyotehem ha-Ezrahiyot ve-ha-Leumiyot (1918-1922) (The Struggle of Polish Jewry for Civil and National Minority Rights [1918-1922])
- Randolph L. Braham (ed) Perspectives on the Holocaust. The Hungarian Jewish Catastrophe. A Selected and Annotated Bibliography
- Raul Hilberg The Destruction of the European Jews
- Władysław Bartoszewski Das Warschauer Ghetto - wie es wirklich war. Zeugenbericht eines Christen ; Oswald Amstler. Solidarität zu Kindern in den nationalsozialistischen Konzentrationslagern
- Yisrael Gutman The Jews of Warsaw 1939-1943: Ghetto, Underground, Revolt
- Yechiel Szeintuch (ed) Yitzhak Katzenelson: Yidishe geto-ksovim: Varshe 1940-1943 (Yitzhak Katzenelson: Yiddish Ghetto Writings: Warsaw 1940-1943)
- Karin Wolff (ed) Hiob 1943. Ein Requiemfür das Warschauer Ghetto
- Lucjan Dobroszycki (ed) The Chronicle of the Łódź Ghetto 1947-1944
- Jack Kugelmass Jonathan Boyarin (editors and translators) From a Ruined Garden. The Memorial Books of Polish Jewry
- Rachel Ertel Le Shtetl. La bourgade juive de Pologne de la tradition à la modernité
- Fr. Tadeusz Sroka Dziennik izraelski czyli religijny wymiar ludzkiego losu (An Israeli Diary, or the Religious Dimension of Man's Fate)
- Znak The Jews in Poland and the World
- Gershon C. Bacon Gershon David Hundert (eds) The Jews in Poland and Russia: Bibliographical Essays
- CONTRIBUTORS
Rachel Ertel Le Shtetl. La bourgade juive de Pologne de la tradition à la modernité
from BOOK REVIEWS
- Frontmatter
- Dedication
- Editors and Advisers
- Contents
- Polin
- Statement From the Editors
- ARTICLES
- DOCUMENTS
- INTERVIEW
- A DIALOGUE
- BIBLIOGRAPHICAL ESSAYS
- BOOK REVIEWS
- Norman Davies Heart of Europe. A Short History of Poland
- Linda Gordon Cossack Rebellions. Social Turmoil in the Sixteenth Century Ukraine
- Edward C. Thaden Russia's Western Borderlands, 1710–7870
- Raymond Pearson. National Minorities in Eastern Europe, 1848-1945; S. M. Horak et al Eastern European. National Minorities, 1979-1980
- Jerzy Tomaszewski Rzeczpospolita wielu narodów (A Republic of Many Nations)
- Henry Rollet La Pologne au XX’ siècle
- Jacob Goldberg (ed) Jewish Privileges in the Polish Commonwealth. Charters of Rights Granted to Jewish Communities in Poland-Lithuania in the Sixteenth to Eighteenth Centuries
- Jacob Goldberg (ed) Jewish Privileges in the Polish Commonwealth. Charters of Rights Granted to Jewish Communities in Poland-Lithuania in the Sixteenth to Eighteenth Centuries
- Maurycy Horn (ed) Regesty dokumentów i ekscerpty z Metryki Koronnej do Historii, (Żydów w Polsee 1697-1795. T. I: Czasy saskie (1697-1763); T. IL· Rzlądy Stanisiława Augusta (1764-1795), Część I: (1764-1779) (Summaries of Records and Excerpts of the Crown Registry Relating to the History of Jews in Poland, 1697-1795. Vol. I; The Saxon Era [1697-1763]; Vol. II: The Reign of Stanislaw August [1764'-95], Part I, 1764-79)
- Chone Shmeruk The Esterke Story in riddish and Polish Literature. A Case Study in the Mutual Relations of Two Cultural Traditions
- David Darshan Shir HaMa ‘alot L ‘David and Ktav Hitnazzelut L ‘Darshanim. Translated and Annotated by H. G. Perelmuter
- Raphael Mahler Hasidism and the Jewish Enlightenment. Translated from the Yiddish Eugene Orenstein. Translated from the Hebrew by Aaron Klein Jenny Machlowitz Klein
- Michael Stanislawski Tsar Nicholas I and the Jews: The Transformation of Jewish Society in Russia 1825-1855
- O. O. Gruzenberg Yesterday: Memoirs of a Russian-Jewish Lawyerby Don C.|Rawson
- David Berger (ed) The Legacy of Jewish Migration: 1881 and Its Impact
- Steven E. Aschheim Brothers and Strangers. The East European Jew in German and German Jewish Consciousness, 1800-1923
- A vigdor Dagan, Gertrude Hirschler and Lewis Weiner (eds) The Jews of Czechoslovakia. Historical Studies and Surveys
- Ferdinand Seibt (ed) Die Juden in den bohmischen Liindern. Vortriige der Tagung des Collegium Carolinum in Bad Wiessee
- Ezra Mendelsohn The Jews of East Central Europe Between the World Wars
- Joseph Marcus Social and Political History of the Jews in Poland, 1919-1939
- Shlomo Netzer Ma'avak rehudei Polin al Zekhuyotehem ha-Ezrahiyot ve-ha-Leumiyot (1918-1922) (The Struggle of Polish Jewry for Civil and National Minority Rights [1918-1922])
- Randolph L. Braham (ed) Perspectives on the Holocaust. The Hungarian Jewish Catastrophe. A Selected and Annotated Bibliography
- Raul Hilberg The Destruction of the European Jews
- Władysław Bartoszewski Das Warschauer Ghetto - wie es wirklich war. Zeugenbericht eines Christen ; Oswald Amstler. Solidarität zu Kindern in den nationalsozialistischen Konzentrationslagern
- Yisrael Gutman The Jews of Warsaw 1939-1943: Ghetto, Underground, Revolt
- Yechiel Szeintuch (ed) Yitzhak Katzenelson: Yidishe geto-ksovim: Varshe 1940-1943 (Yitzhak Katzenelson: Yiddish Ghetto Writings: Warsaw 1940-1943)
- Karin Wolff (ed) Hiob 1943. Ein Requiemfür das Warschauer Ghetto
- Lucjan Dobroszycki (ed) The Chronicle of the Łódź Ghetto 1947-1944
- Jack Kugelmass Jonathan Boyarin (editors and translators) From a Ruined Garden. The Memorial Books of Polish Jewry
- Rachel Ertel Le Shtetl. La bourgade juive de Pologne de la tradition à la modernité
- Fr. Tadeusz Sroka Dziennik izraelski czyli religijny wymiar ludzkiego losu (An Israeli Diary, or the Religious Dimension of Man's Fate)
- Znak The Jews in Poland and the World
- Gershon C. Bacon Gershon David Hundert (eds) The Jews in Poland and Russia: Bibliographical Essays
- CONTRIBUTORS
Summary
One of the most unusual characteristics of Poland as compared with other European countries, was a large Jewish presence in villages and townlets. In the inter-war period approximately 30 per cent of Jews lived in such settlements. Although most of the Jewish population inhabited towns and cities, Jews from small towns (fewer than 20,000 people) constituted an average of 62 per cent of all Jewish townsmen. In some areas of eastern Poland these figures were even higher.
These settlements, shtetlekh, were fascinating centres of Jewish life and culture, and places of daily contacts between Jews and Christian Poles. It is therefore surprising how few books on the shtetl have been published. Hence one welcomes every publication dealing with this important aspect of Jewish life before the Holocaust. Unfortunately, the work of Rachel Ertel does not fulfil our expectations.
The author, who teaches American and Jewish civilization in Paris, attempts to show the evolution of shtetlekh from tradition to modernity. The first quarter of the book is an historical summary of Jewish life in Poland from the Middle Ages to the beginning of the 20th century. This is based on secondary material only, much of which is quite old. The history of Jews in Poland is treated in total isolation from Polish history, about which the author knows precious little. The book abounds with factual mistakes too numerous to quote here. Some of these suggest a lack of basic historical knowledge: Potop (literally the Flood), is explained as ‘a name given to massacres caused by the rising of Bogdan Chmielnicki against the Polish rule and by the Polish-Swedish war (1548-1657)'!
No Polish sources have been consulted with a few exceptions, one of which is quoted in a footnote but never invoked (the work of Witold Kula, footnote 32, p. 36), the other invoked wrongly (suggesting, for instance, that W. Pobóg-Malinowski in his history of Poland describes the period between 1926 and 1935 as ‘a one-party régime of Piłsudski’, p. 177).
Three model shtetlekh are briefly described: Bekhatów (Belhative), Zdzięioł (Zetl) and Nowy Sącz (Santz), which for some reason she calls Sąc. (Incidentally, the transliteration of both Polish and Yiddish names is far from perfect.)
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- Poles and Jews: Renewing the Dialogue , pp. 409 - 411Publisher: Liverpool University PressPrint publication year: 2004