Jewish Life. Tales from Nineteenth-Century Europe, By Leopold von Sacher-Masoch, Translated with an Afterword by Virginia Lewis

This work, originally published in Mannheim in 1891, is a collection of twenty-six stories illustrating various aspect of Jewish life and culture in Europe prior to the twentieth century. Each story takes place in a different country, ranging from England to Turkey, and develops an isolated topic or theme from Jewish life, such as its holidays, cabalism, the Chasidic movement, fanaticism, secularism, etc., in a sometimes humorous, sometimes dramatic, and often sentimental fashion. While the endings are always happy, the level of historic realism in the stories is high. Jewish Life offers a richly detailed portrait of Jewish customs and culture prior to the deplorably successful attempt to destroy them during the Holocaust.