Isaac Bashevis Singer

Today is the birthday of renowned Yiddish author

Isaac Bashevis Singer

(21 November 1902 – 24 July 1991)

was a Polish-born Jewish-American author. He was a leading figure in the Yiddish literary movement, writing and publishing only in Yiddish, and was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1978. He also was awarded two U.S. National Book Awards, one in Children’s Literature for his memoir A Day Of Pleasure: Stories of a Boy Growing Up in Warsaw (1970) and one in Fiction for his collection, A Crown of Feathers and Other Stories (1974).

Several of Isaac’s books were made into films. His novel Enemies, a Love Story was adapted as a film by the same name (1989) and was quite popular, bringing new readers to his work. He featured a Holocaust survivor who deals with varying desires, complex family relationships, and a loss of faith. Singer’s story, “Yentl,” was adapted into a film by that name (1983) starring singer Barbra Streisand. Perhaps the most fascinating Singer-inspired film is 1974’s Mr. Singer’s Nightmare or Mrs. Pupkos Beard, directed by Bruce Davidson, a renowned photographer who became Singer’s neighbor. This unique film is a half-hour mixture of documentary and fantasy for which Singer wrote the script and played the leading role. The 2007 film Love Comes Lately, starring Otto Tausig, was adapted from several of Singer’s stories.