Yiddish theatre

Yiddish theatre consists of plays written and performed primarily by Jews in Yiddish, the language of the Eastern European Ashkenazaic Jewish community. The range of Yiddish theatre is broad: operetta, musical comedy, and satiric or nostalgic revues; melodrama; naturalist drama; expressionist and modernist plays. At its height, its geographical scope was comparably broad: from the late 19th century until just before World War II, professional Yiddish theatre could be found throughout the heavily Jewish areas of Eastern and East Central Europe, but also in Berlin, London, Paris, and, perhaps above all, New York City.

References

• —, "Actors Own New Theater", New York Times, February 8, 1903, 32. This article also reviews a production of Lateiner's melodrama Zion, or on the Rivers of Babylon at the Grand Theater, and gives a quick survey of the history and character of Yiddish theater and its audience in New York at that time.
• —, "Burial of a Yiddish Poet", New York Times, January 12, 1908, 8.
• —, Partial list of plays by Goldfaden; the names are useful, but some of the dates are certainly incorrect. Retrieved January 11, 2005.
• Adler, Jacob, A Life on the Stage: A Memoir, translated and with commentary by Lulla Rosenfeld, Knopf, New York, 1999, ISBN 067941351.
• Bercovici, Israil, O sută de ani de teatru evreiesc în România ("One hundred years of Yiddish/Jewish theater in Romania"), 2nd Romanian-language edition, revised and augmented by Constantin Măciucă. Editura Integral (an imprint of Editurile Universala), Bucharest (1998). ISBN 9739827225. See the article on the author for further publication information. Bercovici cites many sources. The information on profesional Yiddish theater in 1840s Warsaw comes from a contemporaneous account published in the Allgemeine Preussische Staatszeitung, Nr. 341, 6.XII.1838, apparently recounting an article that appeared November 12, 1838 in a Frankfurt am Main paper. The quotation from the New Yorker Yiddishe Ilustrirte Zaitung is dated January 11, 1888.
• Berkowitz, Joel, Avrom Goldfaden and the Modern Yiddish Theater: The Bard of Old Constantine, Pakn Treger, no. 44, Winter 2004, 10-19, gives a good sketch of Goldfaden's career, but also discusses 20th century approaches to the Goldfadenian repertoire.
• Chira, Susan, "100 Years of Yiddish Theater Celebrated", New York Times, October 15, 1982, C28.
• Goldberg, Isaac, "New York's Yiddish Writers" in The Bookman, volume 46 (684-689), Dodd, Mead & Company, New York, 1918.
• Kanfer, Stefan, "The Yiddish Theater?s Triumph". City Journal, Spring 2004.
• Melamed, S.M., "The Yiddish Stage", New York Times, Sep 27, 1925 (X2)
• Sandrow, Nahma, "The Father of Yiddish Theater", Zamir, Autumn 2003, 9-15. This publication from the Zamir chorale of Boston contains numerous articles on topics related to Yiddish theatre.