Annal: 1970 National Book Award for Young People’s Literature

Isaac Bashevis Singer’s memories of his youth in Poland make a powerful, brilliant children’s book. The author lays out a panorama of Jewish life in the city—the rabbis in black velvet and gabardine, the shopkeepers, the street urchins and schoolboys, the poverty, the confusion, the excitement of the prewar time. But even more, the author reveals himself; and the torments and mysteries that plagued him as a child will make his stories fascinating to other children.