Songs for the Butcher's Daughter

A Novel

Fiction & Literature, Literary
Cover of the book Songs for the Butcher's Daughter by Peter Manseau, Free Press
View on Amazon View on AbeBooks View on Kobo View on B.Depository View on eBay View on Walmart
Author: Peter Manseau ISBN: 9781416579731
Publisher: Free Press Publication: September 16, 2008
Imprint: Free Press Language: English
Author: Peter Manseau
ISBN: 9781416579731
Publisher: Free Press
Publication: September 16, 2008
Imprint: Free Press
Language: English

Summer, sweltering, 1996. A book warehouse in western Massachusetts. A man at the beginning of his adult life -- and the end of his career rope -- becomes involved with a woman, a language, and a great lie that will define his future. Most auspiciously of all, he runs across Itsik Malpesh, a ninetysomething Russian immigrant who claims to be the last Yiddish poet in America. When a set of accounting ledgers in which Malpesh has written his memoirs surfaces -- twenty-two volumes brimming with adventure, drama, deception, passion, and wit -- the young man is compelled to translate them, telling Malpesh's story as his own life unfolds, and bringing together two paths that coincide in shocking and unexpected ways.

Moving from revolutionary Russia to New York's Depression-era Lower East Side to millennium's-end Baltimore with drama, adventure, and boisterous, feisty charm to spare, the unpeeling of this friendship is a story of the entire twentieth century. For fans of Nicole Krauss, Nathan Englander, Richard Powers, Amy Bloom, and Lore Segal, this book will amaze at every turn: narrated by two poets (one who doesn't know he is and one who doesn't know he isn't), it is a wise and warm look at the constant surprises and ineluctable ravages of time. It's a book about religion, love, and typesetting -- how one passion can be used to goad and thwart the other -- and most of all, about how faith in the power of words can survive even the death of a language.

A novel of faith lost and hope found in translation, Songs for the Butcher's Daughter is at once an immigrant's epic saga, a love story for the ages, a Yiddish-inflected laughing-through-tears tour of world history for Jews and Gentiles alike, and a testament to Manseau's ambitious genius.

View on Amazon View on AbeBooks View on Kobo View on B.Depository View on eBay View on Walmart

Summer, sweltering, 1996. A book warehouse in western Massachusetts. A man at the beginning of his adult life -- and the end of his career rope -- becomes involved with a woman, a language, and a great lie that will define his future. Most auspiciously of all, he runs across Itsik Malpesh, a ninetysomething Russian immigrant who claims to be the last Yiddish poet in America. When a set of accounting ledgers in which Malpesh has written his memoirs surfaces -- twenty-two volumes brimming with adventure, drama, deception, passion, and wit -- the young man is compelled to translate them, telling Malpesh's story as his own life unfolds, and bringing together two paths that coincide in shocking and unexpected ways.

Moving from revolutionary Russia to New York's Depression-era Lower East Side to millennium's-end Baltimore with drama, adventure, and boisterous, feisty charm to spare, the unpeeling of this friendship is a story of the entire twentieth century. For fans of Nicole Krauss, Nathan Englander, Richard Powers, Amy Bloom, and Lore Segal, this book will amaze at every turn: narrated by two poets (one who doesn't know he is and one who doesn't know he isn't), it is a wise and warm look at the constant surprises and ineluctable ravages of time. It's a book about religion, love, and typesetting -- how one passion can be used to goad and thwart the other -- and most of all, about how faith in the power of words can survive even the death of a language.

A novel of faith lost and hope found in translation, Songs for the Butcher's Daughter is at once an immigrant's epic saga, a love story for the ages, a Yiddish-inflected laughing-through-tears tour of world history for Jews and Gentiles alike, and a testament to Manseau's ambitious genius.

More books from Free Press

Cover of the book From Poor Law to Welfare State, 6th Edition by Peter Manseau
Cover of the book The First Strange Place by Peter Manseau
Cover of the book Worried All the Time by Peter Manseau
Cover of the book When Battered Women Kill by Peter Manseau
Cover of the book Flip the Script by Peter Manseau
Cover of the book A Mind of Its Own by Peter Manseau
Cover of the book Mrs. Goose Goes to Washington by Peter Manseau
Cover of the book Origins of Existence by Peter Manseau
Cover of the book Excellent Sheep by Peter Manseau
Cover of the book Comes the Peace by Peter Manseau
Cover of the book Pistol by Peter Manseau
Cover of the book e-Commerce by Peter Manseau
Cover of the book The Stonecutter by Peter Manseau
Cover of the book Hardball by Peter Manseau
Cover of the book High Tech Start Up, Revised And Updated by Peter Manseau
We use our own "cookies" and third party cookies to improve services and to see statistical information. By using this website, you agree to our Privacy Policy