A group of poets and writers called Di-Younge (The Young) were among the nearly two million Jews who emigrated to America from the Pale of Settlement early in this century. Wisse, an accomplished Yiddish scholar, tells the story of two of Di-Younge's most prominent members: Manny Leib, a lyric poet who was among the more fortunate newcomers since he found work as a skilled bootmaker, and Moishe Leib Halpern, who saw poetry as a means of shattering reality. The two are presented as part of the history of immigrant Jews in America. Taking the title of a poem by Halpern as its own, this important work of Jewish scholarship will appeal to readers interested in poetry and in the artistic and intellectual atmosphere of the interwar period.

Hardcover 1988