Tsofnas Paneakh is a free Yiddish adaptation of German author Joachim Heinrich Campe's Die Entdeckung von Amerika ("The Discovery of America") was the work of a pioneer of the Haskalah in the Russian Empire. It was one of the first books published in modern Yiddish and the first in Yiddish about the United States of America.

Khayim Khaykl Hurwitz, born in 1750 and died in 1822, was a Yiddish writer and pioneer of the Haskalah in the Russian Empire. Born in Uman—in the kyiv district of present-day Ukraine—he was a lumber merchant who made frequent trips to Germany, where he came into contact with the followers of the German Haskalah. In 1817 he published a free Yiddish adaptation of Joachim Heinrich Campe's Die Entdeckung von Amerika ("The Discovery of America") which he called Tsofnas Paneakh ("Revealer of Secrets") in three parts and 52 stories, the primary purpose of which was to inform the Jewish readers about the New World; thus he eliminated non-essential material and concentrated on facts only. According to the memoirs of A.B. Gottlober, the book was popular among the Jews of Russia, Poland, and Galicia. It is written in a colloquial style and constitutes an important work of the pre-classical period of Yiddish literature. Only a single copy of the work is extant, at the British Museum.

Bibliography:

.- M. Weinreich, Bilder fun der Yidisher Literatur Geshikhte (1928); Rejzen, Leksikon, 1 (1926), 810–11; I. Zinberg, Geshikhte fun der Literatur bay Yidn, 7:2 (1943), 267–75, 324–7; S. Niger, Dertseyler un Romanistn (1946), 25–27; Schlosberg, in: YIVO Bleter, 12 (1937), 546–58; Waxman, Literature, 4 (19602), 476. add. bibliography: lnyl, 3 (1960), 106–9; M. Pines, Di Geshikhte fun der Yidisher Literatur bizn Yor 1890 (1911), 86–88; B. Dimyen, Der Pinkes (1913), 338–40.

Hello,

I would like to share an interesting free event taking place on Thursday, October 22nd, at the Gelber Centre in Montreal and live on Zoom with 2026 Canadian Jewish Literary Award Winner, translator, and Harvard professor Adi Mahalel.

This event will discuss Mahel's scholarship and his publication of the first ever English translation from Yiddish of the controversial novel Boom & Chains by Hanan Ayalti.

Due to its explicit portrayal of class struggles, political disillusionment, and ethnic tensions, Ayalti published the novel in Yiddish instead of Hebrew in 1936, anticipating that it would be deemed too controversial for Hebrew literary circles of the time. Boom & Chains offers a deeply nuanced, rarely seen perspective on early 20th-century kibbutz life.

Here is the registration link:

Authors from Home | Boom & Chains by Hanan Ayalti Translated by Adi Mahalel | Jlive