National Book Award Non Fiction Winner
World of Our Fathers
by Irving Howe
Summary
A sweeping social history of the East European Jewish migration to the United States and the working class culture that flourished in New York's Lower East Side. Howe weaves labor struggle, theater, journalism, and family life into a portrait of a vanishing world, drawing on Yiddish sources rarely translated for English readers. The book became an unexpected bestseller and helped revive popular interest in secular Jewish identity.
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Historical Context & Significance
Howe spent years interviewing aging immigrants; the book is credited with sparking a massive 1970s revival of interest in Yiddish culture and secular Jewish identity.