Translator’s Note

By translating Abraham Karpinowitz’s work from Yiddish into English, I hope to bring his stories to a wide contemporary audience. Like any important writer, Karpinowitz deserves the international audience that translation into English makes possible.

I have weighed the question of how much background to provide for the contemporary English reader. I have asked myself to what extent I should be acting as a cultural historian, bringing not only the language of the stories to non-Yiddish readers, but also their world. I have struggled with establishing where the breaking point lies in the tension between cultural explanation and interpretation on the one hand and loyalty to the original literary work on the other.

I have decided to provide a section of notes at the end of the book to give interested readers some background to Karpinowitz’s stories and memoirs. These notes include definitions of Yiddish words that defy translation into English and that may be unfamiliar to the reader, information about historical figures who appear in the stories, and explanations about Vilna institutions and geographic landmarks. Vilna street names are retained in the Yiddish original with translation in the glossary.

In deference to readers who would like to read the stories straight through without a nagging call to seek clarification, there are no markings on the pages drawing attention to items elaborated upon in the notes.

The maps of interwar Vilna on pages 156–57 allow the reader to follow Karpinowitz’s characters as they move through a complex web of small courtyards, streets, and passageways and unto outlying towns and communities.

All translations from the Yiddish that appear in the introduction and notes are by the translator, unless otherwise indicated. Justin Cammy provided his own translations for the foreword, unless otherwise indicated.

Transliteration Guidelines

Yiddish is written using the Hebrew alphabet. I have used YIVO (the Institute for Jewish Research) transliteration guidelines unless words are commonly known in English, at which point I have used the spelling that appears in the Miriam Webster Dictionary online (http://www.merriam-webster.com). When names of individuals have already been frequently transliterated using Roman letters, as in the cases of Jonas Turkow and Zishe Breitbart, I have maintained the most commonly used spelling. Note that the final “e” in Yiddish words like Daytshe, and in names like Tevke and Hirshke, is not silent but pronounced similarly to the final “a” in “sofa.”

For Hebrew words, I have used the transliteration most commonly used in English language texts (based on Google searches).