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A Bintel Brief #1
A Bintel Brief: Sixty Years of Letters from the Lower East Side to the Jewish Daily Forward
For more than eighty years the Jewish Daily Forward 's legendary advice column, "A Bintel Brief" ("a bundle of letters") dispensed shrewd, practical, and fair-minded advice to its readers. Created in 1906 to help bewildered Eastern European immigrants learn about their new country, the column also gave them a forum for seeking advice and support in the face of problems ranging from wrenching spiritual dilemmas to petty family squabbles to the sometimes hilarious predicaments that result when Old World meets New. Isaac Metzker's beloved selection of these letters and responses has become for today's readers a remarkable oral record not only of the varied problems of Jewish immigrant life in America but also of the catastrophic events of the first half of our century.
Foreword and Notes by Harry Golden
Foreword and Notes by Harry Golden
240 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1971
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 45 reviews
February 21, 2024
Families struggling for a chance to survive and thrive
As a journalist who specializes in covering religious and cultural diversity, I'm fascinated by the hundreds of newspapers and magazines that sprang up to meet the waves of immigrants arriving in the U.S. in the early 20th Century. Recently, through the recommendation of a Goodreads friend, I learned that Schocken publishes a collection of columns from A Bintel Brief (a bundle of letters), a newspaper series launched by the legendary Forward editor Abraham Cahan. Not only was Cahan a co-founder of the original Yiddish Forward in New York City in 1897—he served as its Editor in Chief for 43 years!
Cahan and his staff had close ties to Jewish neighborhoods, labor unions, merchants and political movements in New York City, which the paper closely covered in each issue. But, Cahan eventually realized that his Forward was missing out on many important issues in the everyday family lives of his readers. Thus, in 1906, A Bintel Brief was born. Cahan's invitation for his readers to send in letters about the joys, the dilemmas and the sorrows of family life was an instant hit—especially when readers realized that the Forward staff would respond with wise advice. Think of a pioneering Yiddish version of Ask Ann Landers (founded in 1943) or Dear Abby (founded in 1956).
In fact, Cahan's idea was so popular that the Introduction to this book says that some enterprising merchants in New York began hanging out shingles, aimed at customers who could not write Yiddish, selling the services of a Bintel Brief-style ghost writer. For a fee, of course.
According to the Introduction, Cahan and his staff became quite astute at choosing the sincere letters from real people and weeding out any signs of overblown ghost writing—or any evidence that a letter was a fake.
The best of the resulting letters are collected in nearly 200 pages of correspondence translated into English—edited by Isaac Metzker, who I've now learned produced a second volume as well. I don't have that second volume but am eager to find a copy in the future.
This is a fascinating collage showcasing early immigrants trying to survive in the teeming and frequently cut-throat neighborhoods of New York City. Later in the book, we glimpse the challenges faced by first- and second-generation immigrants as they spread out across the United States.
Many of these mini-dramas are bittersweet.
One recurring issue voiced in these letters struck home for me, given some of the complex issues in my own family tree: In that era a century ago of rapid global migration and few modes of communication, men and women sometimes completely lost track of their loved ones. Perhaps a parent "went West" in search of a better income. Or, maybe they moved to another big city in hopes of plying their trade more easily. The main mode of communication—hand-written letters—could lag by weeks or even months. In some cases, families simply lost track of a loved one! Perhaps they had died. Or, in more than one case, a second family was started thousands of miles away!
For me, those stories of loss are some of the most heart-breaking letters in this collection.
In one case in 1906, a wife in New York City finally discovers that her husband is alive, living in Colorado, but near death from what apparently was tuberculosis. She tells the Bintel Brief that she rushed to his side, despite the difficult cross-country journey with their children. Once she reached him, "I fought my bitter lot like a lion, trying to chase the angel of death away from my husband." I won't spoil the suspense by sharing the end of her saga in this review, but this letter illustrates some of the personal heroism and high emotion that runs through these letters.
There are letters from people who were eager to embrace the freedom they found in America to marry someone of a different faith for the sake of love—in one instance a Christian-Jewish marriage, in another case an Orthodox woman marrying a much more liberal man. As such marriages matured, unforeseen friction arose. One place these frustrated couples turned was the Bintel Brief.
"I don't know what to do," is a common lament in such letters.
Rather than prescribing any dire steps, the editors preferred to counsel with compassion, patience and flexibility. "Get along with kindness" was one response to such a marital dilemma.
The emotion is palpable. In one letter, a man asked for the editors' advice about whether he should admit to his wife that he was so depressed that he had tried to commit suicide—and very nearly succeeded.
The editors' advice to keep silent about this matter seems shocking today. Of course, now we know that such a suicidal attempt is a cry for help—and we encourage people to reach out for the assistance they need. But, this exchange of letters about the temptation of suicide is worth reading because of the editors' explanation for their choice of this letter—among the hundreds they received—to publish. The letter illustrates the lethal effects of chronic poverty, the editors argued. "This letter depicting the sad life of this worker is more powerful than any protest against the inequity between rich and poor," the editors wrote.
I'm so pleased Schocken published this collection. Each page carries me into yet another family drama—some of which I can relate to from my own family history.
This book is a window peering deep into lives, each one struggling for a chance for their families to survive and thrive.
As a journalist who specializes in covering religious and cultural diversity, I'm fascinated by the hundreds of newspapers and magazines that sprang up to meet the waves of immigrants arriving in the U.S. in the early 20th Century. Recently, through the recommendation of a Goodreads friend, I learned that Schocken publishes a collection of columns from A Bintel Brief (a bundle of letters), a newspaper series launched by the legendary Forward editor Abraham Cahan. Not only was Cahan a co-founder of the original Yiddish Forward in New York City in 1897—he served as its Editor in Chief for 43 years!
Cahan and his staff had close ties to Jewish neighborhoods, labor unions, merchants and political movements in New York City, which the paper closely covered in each issue. But, Cahan eventually realized that his Forward was missing out on many important issues in the everyday family lives of his readers. Thus, in 1906, A Bintel Brief was born. Cahan's invitation for his readers to send in letters about the joys, the dilemmas and the sorrows of family life was an instant hit—especially when readers realized that the Forward staff would respond with wise advice. Think of a pioneering Yiddish version of Ask Ann Landers (founded in 1943) or Dear Abby (founded in 1956).
In fact, Cahan's idea was so popular that the Introduction to this book says that some enterprising merchants in New York began hanging out shingles, aimed at customers who could not write Yiddish, selling the services of a Bintel Brief-style ghost writer. For a fee, of course.
According to the Introduction, Cahan and his staff became quite astute at choosing the sincere letters from real people and weeding out any signs of overblown ghost writing—or any evidence that a letter was a fake.
The best of the resulting letters are collected in nearly 200 pages of correspondence translated into English—edited by Isaac Metzker, who I've now learned produced a second volume as well. I don't have that second volume but am eager to find a copy in the future.
This is a fascinating collage showcasing early immigrants trying to survive in the teeming and frequently cut-throat neighborhoods of New York City. Later in the book, we glimpse the challenges faced by first- and second-generation immigrants as they spread out across the United States.
Many of these mini-dramas are bittersweet.
One recurring issue voiced in these letters struck home for me, given some of the complex issues in my own family tree: In that era a century ago of rapid global migration and few modes of communication, men and women sometimes completely lost track of their loved ones. Perhaps a parent "went West" in search of a better income. Or, maybe they moved to another big city in hopes of plying their trade more easily. The main mode of communication—hand-written letters—could lag by weeks or even months. In some cases, families simply lost track of a loved one! Perhaps they had died. Or, in more than one case, a second family was started thousands of miles away!
For me, those stories of loss are some of the most heart-breaking letters in this collection.
In one case in 1906, a wife in New York City finally discovers that her husband is alive, living in Colorado, but near death from what apparently was tuberculosis. She tells the Bintel Brief that she rushed to his side, despite the difficult cross-country journey with their children. Once she reached him, "I fought my bitter lot like a lion, trying to chase the angel of death away from my husband." I won't spoil the suspense by sharing the end of her saga in this review, but this letter illustrates some of the personal heroism and high emotion that runs through these letters.
There are letters from people who were eager to embrace the freedom they found in America to marry someone of a different faith for the sake of love—in one instance a Christian-Jewish marriage, in another case an Orthodox woman marrying a much more liberal man. As such marriages matured, unforeseen friction arose. One place these frustrated couples turned was the Bintel Brief.
"I don't know what to do," is a common lament in such letters.
Rather than prescribing any dire steps, the editors preferred to counsel with compassion, patience and flexibility. "Get along with kindness" was one response to such a marital dilemma.
The emotion is palpable. In one letter, a man asked for the editors' advice about whether he should admit to his wife that he was so depressed that he had tried to commit suicide—and very nearly succeeded.
The editors' advice to keep silent about this matter seems shocking today. Of course, now we know that such a suicidal attempt is a cry for help—and we encourage people to reach out for the assistance they need. But, this exchange of letters about the temptation of suicide is worth reading because of the editors' explanation for their choice of this letter—among the hundreds they received—to publish. The letter illustrates the lethal effects of chronic poverty, the editors argued. "This letter depicting the sad life of this worker is more powerful than any protest against the inequity between rich and poor," the editors wrote.
I'm so pleased Schocken published this collection. Each page carries me into yet another family drama—some of which I can relate to from my own family history.
This book is a window peering deep into lives, each one struggling for a chance for their families to survive and thrive.
February 4, 2021
What a great primary source! Advice column letters from the Forward from 1906 to the 1960s. Fascinating stories, and I love how progressive the responses were, especially on questions of justice and labor. (They did tell the mother of a young midcentury vegetarian to take him to a specialist to convince him to eat meat again, but they were promptly called out by a vegetarian society.)
May 5, 2017
This book is amazing. I love slice-of-life glimpses of how people really lived, what they thought, etc. And that's exactly what's here! The stories are amazing - each page is its own mini-soap opera, and I really wish there were some way to know how (if) some of these situations were resolved!
March 15, 2015
You can see why Liana Finck wrote a (fantastic) graphic novel based on it -- this book is fantastic. A glimpse into another world, and the many lives in it. Absolutely wonderful.
June 16, 2024
Very moving time capsule for American Ashkenazi Jewry and the hardships of working-class immigrants at the turn of the century. I wish the editor's answers hadn't been summarized but it's true that most of the time the letters themselves were powerful enough. I've heard Abe Cahan edited and even ghostwrote a few of the Bintel Briefs to make a few political points but I hardly mind. Some of them would make great subjects for a mussar d'var torah (ethics sermon), especially the Irishman who owned a pork business wanting to join the synagogue. And I appreciate the editors taking a consistently strong pro-labor stance without insulting religion in its answers. I want to look up the contemporary meaning of "freethinker". Is it just an atheist or something more specific?
The book's forward, with its self-satisfied nostalgic tone of one who has Succeeded In America, feels more dated than the letters themselves, which could be written today by so many tired huddle masses from impoverished countries rounded up by border patrol, working on the farms and slaughterhouses and cleaning crews.
I had read Liana Finick's new edition of A Bintel Brief a few years ago but I felt her illustrations distracted from the letters themselves. This one's way better.
The book's forward, with its self-satisfied nostalgic tone of one who has Succeeded In America, feels more dated than the letters themselves, which could be written today by so many tired huddle masses from impoverished countries rounded up by border patrol, working on the farms and slaughterhouses and cleaning crews.
I had read Liana Finick's new edition of A Bintel Brief a few years ago but I felt her illustrations distracted from the letters themselves. This one's way better.
May 11, 2025
Interesting snapshots of history and culture captured through letters to the editor of the Jewish Daily Forward over the course of 60+ years. For generations, “Forverts” readers wrote in about a variety of quandaries, some simple and timeless, others difficult and thought-provoking reflections of unprecedented times. A good primary source read.
September 28, 2015
This book is interesting as a primary source of Jewish-American history, a collection of letters from early-to-mid twentieth century Jews regarding their concerns, perceptions, and experiences. Obviously, this book contains only a fraction of the letters submitted to the Forward, so, obviously, Metzker is trying to say something with the letters he chose to present. Most of the letters come from the first few decades of the century, with a lesser amount representing the 40s, 50s, and 60s. The early letters are often heart-breaking in their pathos, relating poverty, depression, degradation, and strife, while the late letters showcase success, wealth, and material comfort. At the same time, though, the early letters have life, hope, and faith, while the later letters lament pettiness, alienation, and assimilation. So, Metzker seems to be saying that, while the Jews' material situation improved in America, their spiritual situation deteriorated, and despite the poverty and suffering, Jews had a more meaningful existence in old New York. And as evidenced by his choice of anchoring letter, Metzker feels we would benefit from a bit of return to the old Yiddishkeit, though it bears mentioning that a key observation made by the editors of the Forward is that longing for the old days is often nostalgia for youth, rather than an accurate remembrance of better times.
May 13, 2016
My sister bought this book when we visited the Tenement Museum in New York City. The museum and neighborhood walking tours were fascinating. This book is such an interesting part of that history. The Bintel Brief was an advice column in the Yiddish paper. The book contains letters and summaries of the responses that appeared in the column from 1906 to 1956. They allow us a peak at the the lives of Jewish immigrants from newly arrived to their professional grandchildren living in the suburbs in the post war era. Young men fleeing conscription in the Russian army. The heart break of loosing family in the programs, and the holocaust. The challenge of adapting to America and at the same time preserving culture and religion. So much history from a very individual point of view.
January 23, 2022
A Bintel Brief: Sixty Years of Letters from the Lower East Side to the Jewish Daily Forward consists of six decades of letters, many heart-breaking in their sadness, collected from the Lower East Side (of New York City) to “Jewish Daily Forward.” They seek advice from the “worthy editors” on how to survive and succeed in the Golden Medina. The first thirty-six pages have letters dating from 1906-1907. Next come 10 pages of black and white photos, followed by thirty-one pages of letters from 1908-1909. All were written in Yiddish, translated in the book.
For the most part, the letters’ authors are “greenhorns”—the new Jewish immigrants from Eastern Europe. Can they find enough work to support their families? Will they become Socialists or Free-Thinkers? How do they find the right girl/boy to marry? What will become of women whose husbands are too ill to work, or desert them entirely? How can they work such long hours and also take care of their children? Somehow they persevere as the book moves more rapidly through the 1920s, 1930s and 1940s, with some years without any letters, until the final letter from 1969. Many are from parents proud of the children who have become college graduates, professionals and businessmen, but there is always something to kvetch about—often a son or daughter-in-law. We start hearing from the grown children of immigrants, some who are ashamed of the parents’ old-fashioned ways, some who join the armed forces, some who want to emigrate to Israel. My only complaint, which is why I gave the book 4 stars instead of 5, is that I would like to have seen more letters from those later years, and not just because my new novel, The Choice: A Novel of Love, Faith and The Talmud is set in 1950s Brooklyn.
This is a fascinating, and poignant, window into the lives of many of our Jewish ancestors. However nostalgic and distressing I found their problems, below the surface I was always aware that these people were survivors. It was the relatives they left behind in places like Lithuania, Belarus and Poland that we should feel sorry for.
For the most part, the letters’ authors are “greenhorns”—the new Jewish immigrants from Eastern Europe. Can they find enough work to support their families? Will they become Socialists or Free-Thinkers? How do they find the right girl/boy to marry? What will become of women whose husbands are too ill to work, or desert them entirely? How can they work such long hours and also take care of their children? Somehow they persevere as the book moves more rapidly through the 1920s, 1930s and 1940s, with some years without any letters, until the final letter from 1969. Many are from parents proud of the children who have become college graduates, professionals and businessmen, but there is always something to kvetch about—often a son or daughter-in-law. We start hearing from the grown children of immigrants, some who are ashamed of the parents’ old-fashioned ways, some who join the armed forces, some who want to emigrate to Israel. My only complaint, which is why I gave the book 4 stars instead of 5, is that I would like to have seen more letters from those later years, and not just because my new novel, The Choice: A Novel of Love, Faith and The Talmud is set in 1950s Brooklyn.
This is a fascinating, and poignant, window into the lives of many of our Jewish ancestors. However nostalgic and distressing I found their problems, below the surface I was always aware that these people were survivors. It was the relatives they left behind in places like Lithuania, Belarus and Poland that we should feel sorry for.
February 5, 2023
Very interesting and I’m 10% Jewish
May 27, 2025
Same reason I always enjoyed Dear Abby, Ann Landers and to some extent Reddit…people have interesting stories to share!
Read
December 26, 2023i’m so grateful to have such a rich cultural history
January 16, 2021
I read this over the course of several years, a letter to the editors or two while waiting for the computer to update or for an adobe program to open. Almost every letter in here holds the heart of an absolutely devastating story, but some are harsher than others. They didn’t call it the ghetto for nothing. Most disturbing for me were letters from young women who were the survivors of sexual violence either in pogroms in the old country or at the hands of employers or “uncles “ in the land of opportunity. Writing in their own words for print in a conservative idiom over 100 years ago, you might miss the meaning as they ask the worthy editors for advice. Shall I tell my fiancé of my dishonor?
I was also often taken aback by the responses of the social democratic Yiddish editors. I would read a letter and think, boof! That’s a tricky one! And then the editors’s advice would be spot on. I like to imagine these editors discussing the letters... which ones to print, how to answer them, how the editors came to consensus, amid the urgency of the times: Triangle Shirtwaist Fire, rise of fascism, Zionism and Palestine. The further I got into what I had imagined would be a casual read the more riveted I was. But I still kept to a snail’s pace because so many of the letters are so upsetting that I didn’t want to just launch into the next one.
I was also often taken aback by the responses of the social democratic Yiddish editors. I would read a letter and think, boof! That’s a tricky one! And then the editors’s advice would be spot on. I like to imagine these editors discussing the letters... which ones to print, how to answer them, how the editors came to consensus, amid the urgency of the times: Triangle Shirtwaist Fire, rise of fascism, Zionism and Palestine. The further I got into what I had imagined would be a casual read the more riveted I was. But I still kept to a snail’s pace because so many of the letters are so upsetting that I didn’t want to just launch into the next one.
January 3, 2015
This book was GREAT if you love snapshots of history. I was surprised how many of these turn of the century Jewish Immigrants were "Free Thinkers" (atheists) and revolutionaries. I feel like we all know a ton of Jewish history following WWI and especially WWII and beyond - but this is a great glimpse into Eastern European Jewish lives prior to what we think we know. It is also fascinating how much more conservative the advice becomes in the 50's compared to what it was at the turn of the century. I only gave 4 stars instead of 5 stars because it does not print the entire advice columns, just a synopsis of the advice printed. RECOMMEND!!
June 7, 2010
At one of readings of Us: Americans Talk About Love, a lady in the audience told me about this book. I'd never heard of it before but it's an amazing collection of letters written to the Jewish Daily Forward by individuals who had just arrived in America or had come here and then moved back to their respective country. The questions are amazing and some might seem trivial but are heartfelt concerns of that time and definitely bring ties to daily situations that we still deal with in present days. Amazing read.
July 31, 2015
wow. though the book includes a handful of letters post wwii, the strongest concentration is from 1906-wwi. these are the most emotionally intense and least familiar, but the book is chronologically arranged, giving it a peculiar narrative arc: we plunge straight into a hardship colored and complicated by recent memory of terror, gradually giving way to politics and education, and finally relaxing into issues about travel plans. that is, we move from third to second to first world problems, which you would expect to feel like a capitalist cliche, but this is the Forward.
June 17, 2009
I was assigned this for a Jewish women in History course incollege and I was so grateful. I read it in one shot and after reading each tidbit I paused to repeat it to my husband. He eventually got annoyed enough to tell me he would read it on his own. It is a phenomenal window into the struggling livs of the immigrant Jews that cameto America in the early 1900's. Humourous,sad, appalling all at once, this book is definately at the top of my list.
June 18, 2013
It is an interesting book, as far as history of immigration goes. I liked the advices given in the first part of the book. I hated the advices given towards the end though. Apparently, it was not the same person giving advice. I did not like that, I wish there was a claimer for it because I was confused. I like novels, so it wasnt a favorite, but in its genre, it was pretty interesting. Overall, I recommend.
March 10, 2017
The beginning letters read a bit like a soap opera, but overall A Bintel Brief allows a modern audience to experience the thoughts and struggles of those who came before and realize that they're not so different from our own.
As Harry Golden writes in the Foreword to this book: "No matter how high we go into outer space, no matter how many planets we eventually explore, the human story will remain the same as it was a thousand years ago, as it will be a thousand years hence, ..."
As Harry Golden writes in the Foreword to this book: "No matter how high we go into outer space, no matter how many planets we eventually explore, the human story will remain the same as it was a thousand years ago, as it will be a thousand years hence, ..."
April 10, 2014
I really enjoyed this book and was very curious to read into the lives of Jewish (some holocaust survivors) men & women from the Lower east side. I'm glad I read although I was particularly disturbed when some of the advice on some of the columns advised the writer not to marry a non Jew. But other than that, very interesting read!
February 18, 2019
This is a collection of letters written to the advice columnist of an American Jewish newspaper. The letters span 60 years and touch on all topics from homesickness and eating kosher to in-law problems and the Holocaust. It felt like a personal look into the lives of a unique group of immigrants. Very easy, quick read.
August 7, 2008
Letters written by Jewish immigrants to the Yiddish newspaper "Forward" and the editors responses. Fantastic insight into the minds of these immigrants and the editors' blunt and no-nonsense replies are excellent.
November 2, 2017
Amazing window into life for new immigrants into New York -- even more appropriate today as we have such different views of immigrants .. shows how hard lives were and how much people wanted to build successful lives!
February 6, 2018
The book provides a fascinating glimpse into the lives and concerns of Eastern European Jewish immigrants to the US. It consists of letters to the editor of the Jewish Daily Forward. As primary sources go, it doesn’t get better than this.
March 13, 2009
Fascinating! Read it in one sitting.
January 6, 2010
A collection of questions and answers from a kind of Jewish "Dear Abby" of the immigrant era. Fun reading.
February 7, 2013
A wonderful read for anyone interested in hearing the voices of Jewish immigrants in the first half of the 20th century
September 14, 2013
I've wanted to read this for a while as research for writing about my grandmother, the daughter of Russian Jewish immigrants. It is a great snapshot of the problems that concerned them.
June 7, 2015
An excellent read.
September 27, 2015
Great collection providing a new (to me) insight into immigrant Jewish life of the first half of the 20th Century. So many brief (ha!) personal stories of tragedy, loss, and hope.
Displaying 1 - 30 of 45 reviews