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The book rescuer : how a mensch from Massachusetts saved Yiddish literature for generations to come

by Macy, Sue,

Format: Print Book 2019
Availability: Available at 13 Libraries 15 of 15 copies

Available (15)
Location Collection Call #
Bridgeville Public Library Children's People and Culture JUV 92 LAN
Location  Bridgeville Public Library
 
Collection  Children's People and Culture
 
Call Number  JUV 92 LAN
 
 
CLP - Main Library First Floor Children's Department - Biography qj Z989.L36 M33 2019
Location  CLP - Main Library
 
Collection  First Floor Children's Department - Biography
 
Call Number  qj Z989.L36 M33 2019
 
 
CLP - Squirrel Hill Children's Biographies qj Z989.L36 M33 2019
Location  CLP - Squirrel Hill
 
Collection  Children's Biographies
 
Call Number  qj Z989.L36 M33 2019
 
 
Clairton Public Library Picture Books JB L294
Location  Clairton Public Library
 
Collection  Picture Books
 
Call Number  JB L294
 
 
Cooper-Siegel Community Library Children's Non Fiction j 92 LAN
Location  Cooper-Siegel Community Library
 
Collection  Children's Non Fiction
 
Call Number  j 92 LAN
 
 
Dormont Public Library Juvenile Non-Fiction J 92 L29
Location  Dormont Public Library
 
Collection  Juvenile Non-Fiction
 
Call Number  J 92 L29
 
 
Jefferson Hills Public Library Easy Nonfiction E 020.7 MAC
Location  Jefferson Hills Public Library
 
Collection  Easy Nonfiction
 
Call Number  E 020.7 MAC
 
 
Monroeville Public Library Juvenile Non-fiction J E 92 LANSKY
Location  Monroeville Public Library
 
Collection  Juvenile Non-fiction
 
Call Number  J E 92 LANSKY
 
 
Mt. Lebanon Public Library Children's Non-Fiction j 92L LANSKY
Location  Mt. Lebanon Public Library
 
Collection  Children's Non-Fiction
 
Call Number  j 92L LANSKY
 
 
Mt. Lebanon Public Library Children's Non-Fiction j 92L LANSKY Mac
Location  Mt. Lebanon Public Library
 
Collection  Children's Non-Fiction
 
Call Number  j 92L LANSKY Mac
 
 
Mt. Lebanon Public Library Children's Non-Fiction j 92L LANSKY Mac
Location  Mt. Lebanon Public Library
 
Collection  Children's Non-Fiction
 
Call Number  j 92L LANSKY Mac
 
 
Northland Public Library Children's Biography J B LANSKY
Location  Northland Public Library
 
Collection  Children's Biography
 
Call Number  J B LANSKY
 
 
Pleasant Hills Public Library Juvenile Juv 92 LANSKY Aaron
Location  Pleasant Hills Public Library
 
Collection  Juvenile
 
Call Number  Juv 92 LANSKY Aaron
 
 
Shaler North Hills Library Juvenile Non-Fiction j 020.75 M
Location  Shaler North Hills Library
 
Collection  Juvenile Non-Fiction
 
Call Number  j 020.75 M
 
 
South Fayette Township Library Picture Book - Informational J I BIOGRAPHY LAN
Location  South Fayette Township Library
 
Collection  Picture Book - Informational
 
Call Number  J I BIOGRAPHY LAN
 
 

Summary
Recipient of a Sydney Taylor Book Award for Younger Readers
An ALA Notable Book
A Bank Street Best Book of the Year

"Text and illustration meld beautifully." -- The New York Times
"Stunning."​ -- Kirkus Reviews (starred review)
" Inspired...[a] journalistic, propulsive narrative. " -- Publishers Weekly (starred review)
"The story comes alive through the bold acrylic and gouache art." -- Booklist (starred review)

From New York Times Best Illustrated Book artist Stacy Innerst and author Sue Macy comes a story of one man's heroic effort to save the world's Yiddish books in their Sydney Taylor Book Award-winning masterpiece.

Over the last forty years, Aaron Lansky has jumped into dumpsters, rummaged around musty basements, and crawled through cramped attics. He did all of this in pursuit of a particular kind of treasure, and he's found plenty. Lansky's treasure was any book written Yiddish, the language of generations of European Jews. When he started looking for Yiddish books, experts estimated there might be about 70,000 still in existence. Since then, the MacArthur Genius Grant recipient has collected close to 1.5 million books, and he's finding more every day.

Told in a folkloric voice reminiscent of Patricia Polacco, this story celebrates the power of an individual to preserve history and culture, while exploring timely themes of identity and immigration.
Published Reviews
Booklist Review: "Yiddish was a dying language (it's still not robust) when a young man, Aaron Lansky, decided to save it. Macy begins the story several generations back, with Lansky's grandmother arriving in America: her suitcase was thrown in the ocean by her brother out with the old, in with the new. Flash-forward to the 1970s, and Aaron is in college, studying Jewish history, and he wants to read books in the common language of European Jews in past centuries, Yiddish. But after the Holocaust and the diaspora of European Jewry, the number of people speaking Yiddish plummeted. Yiddish books were also disappearing, so Lansky decided to make it his mission to rescue them and his ancestors' heritage. Macy's text details how Lansky's pursuit took him out in all kinds of weather, to all kinds of places, where elderly Jews gave him an education in their lives and the importance of their books. An afterword by Lansky tells readers about the Yiddish Book Center, a vibrant organization that, among many other things, fosters learning the language. The story comes alive through the bold acrylic and gouache art, which illustrator Innerst says was inspired by the ""exuberant motifs"" of Marc Chagall. He finds drama in faces, profundity in the weight and number of books. The most outstanding spread places a shtetl on Yiddish pages that resemble matzo. Yiddish appears throughout the text; a glossary explains the words.--Ilene Cooper Copyright 2019 Booklist"
From Booklist, Copyright (c) American Library Association. Used with permission.
Publisher's Weekly Review: "This inspired pairing of two top picture book biographers tells the story of Aaron Lansky, an "all-American boy" (a Star Trek poster decorates his bedroom) who in college became convinced that Yiddish books represented the "portable homeland" of the Jewish people. With Yiddish dying out after the Holocaust and little mainstream support ("Yiddish was a language whose time had passed"), Lansky learned the language, then began saving Yiddish books any way he could. He pulled nearly 5,000 out of a dumpster and accepted "one book at a time" from elderly owners ("We didn't eat much," one book donor tearfully tells him, "but we always bought a book. It was a necessity of life"). Founded in 1980, Lansky's Yiddish Book Center in Amherst, Mass., is today home to 1.5 million rescued books and is a hub of Yiddish studies. Innerst (Ruth Bader Ginsburg), who notes in an afterword that his illustrations were inspired by Chagall, contributes dramatic, textural acrylic and gouache images, with sculptural figures, expressionistic settings, and the deep, rich tones of vintage book bindings. Evoking both a lost past and an urgent present, they're a marvelous complement to the journalistic, propulsive narrative by Macy (Motor Girls). Ages 5--8. (Oct.)"
(c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
Additional Information
Subjects Lansky, Aaron, -- 1955- -- Juvenile literature.
Lansky, Aaron, -- 1955-
National Yiddish Book Center (U.S.) -- History -- Juvenile literature.
National Yiddish Book Center (U.S.) -- History.
Book collectors -- Massachusetts -- New Bedford -- Biography -- Juvenile literature.
Jewish men -- Massachusetts -- New Bedford -- Biography -- Juvenile literature.
Yiddish language -- Revival -- Juvenile literature.
Book collectors.
Jewish men.
Yiddish language -- Revival.
Biographies.
Publisher New York :Simon & Schuster Books for Young Readers,2019
Edition First edition.
Contributors Innerst, Stacy, illustrator.
Audience Ages 5-8; K to grade 3.
Language English
Notes "A Paula Wiseman book."
Description 48 pages : illustrations (some color) ; 29 cm
Bibliography Notes Includes bibliographical references (page 47).
ISBN 9781481472203
1481472208
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