Streets: A Memoir of the Lower East Side (Helen Rose Scheuer Jewish Women's) (The Helen Rose Scheuer Jewish Women's Series) - Hardcover

Spewack, Bella

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 1558611150 ISBN 13: 9781558611153

Publisher: The Feminist Press at CUNY, 1995

Synopsis

   Born in Transylvania at the turn of the century, Bella Cohen Spewack arrived on the streets of New York's Lower East Side when she was three. At 22, while working as a reporter with her husband in Europe, she wrote this memoir of her early years, which she never chose to publish. The publication of Streets more than 70 years later recovers a remarkable voice and revivifies a lost world.

   With a sense of the telling anecdote, the young Bella describes the sights and sounds of her neighborhood, and introduces a wide array of people as her family moves annually to save rent or find a still cheaper apartment. Her mother works as a live-in domestic, then takes on sewing and eventually boarders, as well as a new and unfriendly husband. Bella's world also includes two younger brothers, one of whom needs constant nursing.

   Streets includes the story of Bella's high school years-her mother was determined to make "a lady" of her daughter and would not allow her to work in a factory-and ends before she meets and marries Sam Spewack. At once street-smart and unsentimental Bella is a sturdy American hero who overcomes life's obstacles in a world that will later welcome her as a celebrated author.

About this title

Review

""Streets" gives us an idea of how the immigrant experience has changed, for better and worse . . . and how it has remained the same." "Los Angeles Times"
"Written in the stark, naturalistic prose of a born journalist, the book provides a startling, clear-eyed look at the difficult life millions endured in what sentimentalists call a simpler, happier time in America." "Booklist"
"[Bella Spewack's] voice is strong and individual. Her executors did well to bring the story to publication . . . after her death at the age of ninety-one." "New York Times Book Review"
"Bella's early skills as a writer are evident in her bitter caricatures of the adults who populated this hallucinatory cityscape. Her talents and determination were her ticket out, though she leaves us mindful of the many others who had no such strengths to draw on, and no such fortunate escape." "The Boston Globe"
""Streets" tells both the history of one immigrant girl's struggle to survive and the general history of Jewish immigration to the lower East Side. . . . Ultimately, "Streets" . . . represents a triumph of will and spirit." "Jewish Week""

"Streets gives us an idea of how the immigrant experience has changed, for better and worse . . . and how it has remained the same." --Los Angeles Times

"Written in the stark, naturalistic prose of a born journalist, the book provides a startling, clear-eyed look at the difficult life millions endured in what sentimentalists call a simpler, happier time in America." --Booklist

"[Bella Spewack's] voice is strong and individual. Her executors did well to bring the story to publication . . . after her death at the age of ninety-one." --New York Times Book Review

"Bella's early skills as a writer are evident in her bitter caricatures of the adults who populated this hallucinatory cityscape. Her talents and determination were her ticket out, though she leaves us mindful of the many others who had no such strengths to draw on, and no such fortunate escape." --The Boston Globe

"Streets tells both the history of one immigrant girl's struggle to survive and the general history of Jewish immigration to the lower East Side. . . . Ultimately, Streets . . . represents a triumph of will and spirit." --Jewish Week

"Streets gives us an idea of how the immigrant experience has changed, for better and worse . . . and how it has remained the same." --Los Angeles Times

"Written in the stark, naturalistic prose of a born journalist, the book provides a startling, clear-eyed look at the difficult life millions endured in what sentimentalists call a simpler, happier time in America." --Booklist

"[Bella Spewack's] voice is strong and individual. Her executors did well to bring the story to publication . . . after her death at the age of ninety-one." --New York Times Book Review

"Bella's early skills as a writer are evident in her bitter caricatures of the adults who populated this hallucinatory cityscape. Her talents and determination were her ticket out, though she leaves us mindful of the many others who had no such strengths to draw on, and no such fortunate escape." --The Boston Globe

"Streets tells both the history of one immigrant girl's struggle to survive and the general history of Jewish immigration to the lower East Side. . . . Ultimately, Streets . . . represents a triumph of will and spirit." --Jewish Week

From the Back Cover

Born in Transylvania at the turn of the century, Bella Cohen Spewack arrived with her mother on the streets of New York's Lower East Side in 1902 when she was three years old. At twenty-three, while working as a reporter in Berlin, she wrote this memoir of her early years. After returning to the United States, Bella and her husband, Sam Spewack, became successful playwrights, most notably for the Tony award-winning Broadway musical Kiss Me, Kate.

About this edition

• Publisher: The Feminist Press at CUNY
• Publication date: 1995
• ISBN 10: 1558611150
• ISBN 13: 9781558611153
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 180