In the Shadow of the Shtetl: Small-Town Jewish Life in Soviet Ukraine

by Jeffrey Veidlinger

The story of how the Holocaust decimated Jewish life in the shtetls of Eastern Europe is well known. Still, thousands of Jews in these small towns survived the war and returned afterward to rebuild their communities. The recollections of some 400 returnees in Ukraine provide the basis for Jeffrey Veidlinger’s reappraisal of the traditional narrative of 20th-century Jewish history. These elderly Yiddish speakers relate their memories of Jewish life in the prewar shtetl, their stories of survival during the Holocaust, and their experiences living as Jews under Communism. Despite Stalinist repressions, the Holocaust, and official antisemitism, their individual remembrances of family life, religious observance, education, and work testify to the survival of Jewish life in the shadow of the shtetl to this day.

Genres: History

360 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 2013

Reviews

[Joel Kleehammer · Rating 4 out of 5]

Jeffrey Veidlinger has done it again. Much like his work The Moscow State Yiddish Theater: Jewish Culture on the Soviet Stage, this book is well developed, well thought out, and well put together. Professor Veidlinger, along with his long-time colleague Dov-Ber Kerler and others (too many to name), has continued to develop oral histories as a way of contextualizing histories within a collective memory of events. The main thing I felt at the end of this book was that I wish I had traveled with him to work. I enjoyed this academic work and look forward to more from this author.

[Tara Mizrachi · Rating 5 out of 5]

Well written, well researched, it is the story as of yet untold but so critical to our understanding of past and present events

[The Jewish Book Council]

Reviewed by Jack Fischel for Jewish Book Council