Outwitting History: The Amazing Adventures of a Man Who Rescued a Million Yiddish Books [Hardcover]

Lansky was a 23-year-old graduate student in 1980 when he came up with an idea that would take over his life and change the face of Jewish literary culture: He wanted to save Yiddish books. With few resources save his passion and ironlike determination, Lansky and his fellow dreamers traveled from house to house, Dumpster to Dumpster saving Yiddish books wherever they could find them—eventually gathering an improbable 1.5 million volumes, from famous writers like Sholem Aleichem and I.B. Singer to one-of-a-kind Soviet prints. In his first book, Lansky charmingly describes his adventures as president and founder of the National Yiddish Book Center, which now has new headquarters at Hampshire College in Amherst, Mass. To Lansky, Yiddish literature represented an important piece of Jewish cultural history, a link to the past and a memory of a generation lost to the Holocaust. Lansky's account of salvaging books is both hilarious and moving, filled with Jewish humor, conversations with elderly Jewish immigrants for whom the books evoke memories of a faraway past, stories of desperate midnight rescues from rain-soaked Dumpsters, and touching accounts of Lansky's trips to what were once thriving Jewish communities in Europe. The book is a testimony to his love of Judaism and literature and his desire to make a difference in the world.
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Aaron Lansky discovered while studying Yiddish in the 1970s that thousands of Yiddish books were collecting dust in attics and basements or were being carted off to landfills. With no resources beyond his conviction, chutzpah, and fortitude, he set out to "save the world's Yiddish books" and soon found himself driving all over creation to visit with elderly Jews who talked with great emotion about the beloved Yiddish books they were entrusting to him. The obstacles to his quixotic quest were many, and Lansky became a bibliographic superhero, racing through rain and snow to rescue imperiled collections. Fortuitously, the angels his mission required appeared, and today the organization he founded, the National Yiddish Book Center, collects and redistributes Yiddish books all over the world. Lansky has been written about, but there's no substitute for his own upbeat and profoundly moving account of his adventures and success in preventing the extinction of a uniquely expressive language and literature of survival. Donna Seaman
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What began as a quixotic journey was also a picaresque romp, a detective story, a profound history lesson, and a poignant evocation of a bygone world. The Boston Globe (Boston Globe )

A marvelous yarn, loaded with near-calamitous adventures and characters as memorable as Singer creations. New York Post (New York Post )

The great Yiddish scholar Max Weinreich was delivering a lecture in Finland when the Nazis invaded his native Poland. The lecture saved his life. He made his way to New York, where he opened his doors to new students. Many thought his work was hopelessespecialy since half of the world's Yiddish speakers had been killed in the Holocaust. Asked why he persevered, Weinreich answered simply: Because Yiddish has magic, it will outwit history. And so it hasthough in ways few could have imagined. In 1980, a twenty-three-year-old student named Aaron Lanksy set out to rescue the world's abandoned Yiddish books before it was too late. Precious volumes that had survived Hitler and Stalin were being passed down from older generations of Jewish immigrants to their non-Yiddish-speaking childrenonly to be thrown away or destroyed. With little more than his own chutzpah, Lansky issued a worldwide appeal for unwanted Yiddish books, and the response was overwhelming. Outwitting History is an adventure tale filled with unforgettable characters and told with the exuberance of a man whose passion led him from house to house, country to country, collecting treasured books and heartfelt, often hilarious stories of the vibrant intellectual world these older Jews inhabited. Lansky and a team of young volunteers crisscrossed America, shlepping books from attics and basements, demolition sites and Dumpsters, while shmoozing with their owners, who insisted on feeding them a little noshgefilte fish, kasha, blintzes, latkes, kugelbefore handing over, one book at a time, their beloved literary history. When Lansky started out, experts believed that fewer than 70,000 Yiddish-language books still existed. Twenty-five years and 1.5 million books later, the organization Lansky founded, the National Yiddish Book Center, is one of the largest and fastest-growing Jewish cultural groups in the world. As he takes us along on his groundbreaking journey, Lansky explores the roots of the Yiddish language and introduces us to the brilliant Yiddish writersfrom Mendele to Sholem Aleichem to I.B. Singerwhose lasting cultural relevance is evident on every page. He shares the humor, tenacity, and love for the written word that unites Jewish immigrants with everyone who cares about the future of great literature. And he enables us to see how an almost-lost culture is the bridge between the old world and the future.

In 1980 an entire body of Jewish literature--the physical remnant of Yiddish culture--was on the verge of extinction. Precious volumes that had survived Hitler and Stalin were being passed down from older generations of Jewish immigrants to their non-Yiddish-speaking children only to be discarded or destroyed. So Aaron Lansky, just twenty-three, issued a worldwide appeal for unwanted Yiddish works. Lansky's passion led him to travel from house to house collecting the books--and the stories of these Jewish refugees and the vibrant intellectual world they inhabited. He and a team of volunteers salvaged books from dusty attics, crumbling basements, demolition sites, and dumpsters. When they began, scholars thought that fewer than seventy thousand Yiddish books existed. So far 1.5 million volumes have been saved! Filled with tender and sometimes hilarious stories, this is an inspirational account of a man who had a vision and made a difference. It is a collective love song to the brilliant Yiddish writers--from Mendele to Sholem Aleichem to I. B. Singer--whose lasting cultural relevance is evident on every page.

As a twenty-three-year-old graduate student, Aaron Lanskey set out to save the world's abandoned Yiddish books before it was too late. Today, twenty-five years and one and a half million books later, he has accomplished what has been called the greatest cultural rescue effort in Jewish history. In Outwitting History, Lansky shares his adventures as well as the poignant and often laugh-out-loud stories he heard as he traveled the country collecting books. Introducing us to a dazzling array of writers, he shows us how an almost-lost culture is the bridge between the old world and the futureand how the written word can unite everyone who believes in the power of great literature.

Aaron Lanksy is the founder and president of the National Yiddish Book Center (www.yiddishbookcenter.org) in Amherst, Massachusetts. The recipient of a MacArthur genius fellowship, Lansky has helped fuel a renaissance of Jewish literature in this country. He lives with his family in western Massachusetts.

Winner of a MacArthur "genius grant," Aaron Lansky founded (at the age of 23) and still leads the National Yiddish Book Center, which has rescued and preserved millions of volumes that otherwise would have been destroyed. In this anecdotal memoir, he tells the story of his obsession and eventual success with considerable charm, humor, and literary skill, occasionally digressing with background on the Yiddish language, its writings, and readers, with some perceptive critical explication. Though a little too long, the book spins a great yarn, rendered even better by George Guidall's spirited, informal, and fast-paced rendition. Guidall, who learned the language in his youth, not only pronounces the many Yiddish words and phrases correctly but reads them with just the right nuance and tone of Jewish irony. Y.R. Winner of AudioFile Earphones Award © AudioFile 2006, Portland, Maine-- Copyright © AudioFile, Portland, Maine --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.