Joseph Opatoshu

Polish-born Yiddish writer (1886 – 1954)

Joseph Opatoshu (Yiddish: יוסף אָפּאַטאָשו) (January 1, 1886 – October 7, 1954) was a Polish-born Yiddish novelist and short story writer.^[1] He was the father of actor David Opatoshu.

Biography

Opatoshu was born in 1886 as Yosef Meir Opatowski^[2] to Jewish parents, Dawid (or Dovid) and Nantshe, near Mława, Congress Poland.^[1]

His father, a wood merchant, came from a Hasidic family and had become a Maskil.^[1] He sent Yosef to the best Polish schools in the country. At the age of 19 Yosef went to study engineering in Nancy, France.^{[citation needed]}

However, privation ^{[clarification needed]} sent him to the United States in 1907, where he settled in New York City, where his name became Joseph Opatovsky, and he later took the professional name of Joseph Opatoshu.^{[citation needed]}

Works

Selected novels

• 1914 From the New York Ghetto
• 1914 Di naye heym
• 1918 Alone: Romance of a Forest Girl
• 1921 In Polish Woods
• אין פּוילישע וועלדער, 1921; translated to English from the Yiddish by Isaac Goldberg: In Polish Woods, The Jewish Publication Society of America, 1938
• ראָמאַן פֿון א פֿערד־גנבֿ ,1917; A roman fun a ferd ganev (Romance of a Horsethief)
• The Last Revolt, the story of Rabbi Akiba; translated from the Yiddish by Moshe Spiegel, The Jewish Publication Society of America, 1952
• אַ טאָג אין רעגענסבורג, Di Goldene Pave Paris 1955; translated to English from the Yiddish by Jacob Sloan: A Day in Regensburg; short stories, The Jewish Publication Society of America, 1968
• The Dancer ^{[citation needed]}
• A Day in Regensburg, a writing about Jewish German life in the 16th-century
• Bar-Kokhba (1953), a Hebrew novel

Film adaptation

• A film based on Romance of a Horsethief was released in 1971.^[3] His son, David Opatoshu, wrote the screenplay and it was directed by Abraham Polonsky.^[4] The cast includes Yul Brynner as Captain Stoloff, Eli Wallach as Kifke, Jane Birkin as Naomi, and his son, David, as Schloime Kradnik.^[5]

References

1. Keenoy, Ray (2003). "Opatoshu, Joseph (Yoysef)." In: Sorrel Kerbel (Ed.), Jewish Writers of the Twentieth Century. New York: Fitzroy Dearborn, pp. 747-749.
2. Mohrer, Fruma, and Marek Web (1998). Guide to the YIVO Archives. New York: YIVO Institute for Jewish Research. p. 207.
3. "Romance of a Horsethief". Movies & TV Dept. The New York Times. July 23, 2021. ^{[dead link]}
4. "Romance of a Horsethief Details". Movies & TV Dept. The New York Times. 2016. Archived from the original on March 7, 2016.
5. "Romance of a Horsethief Cast". Movies & TV Dept. The New York Times. 2016. Archived from the original on March 7, 2016.

External links

• Works by Joseph Opatoshu in the Steven Spielberg Digital Library
• Works by Joseph Opatoshu in Hebrew translation. Chabadlibrary.org
• Joseph Opatoshu at IMDb
• Romance of a Horsethief at IMDb
• Joseph Opatoshu's tombstone on the University of Cape Town "Tomb Stone Exhibit" web site
• Studio portrait of (right to left) Moshe (Moses) Kulbak, Joseph Opatoshu, Maks Eryk and Zalman Reisen, board members of the Yiddish P.E.N. Club.1928 (from the Vilna page on the Eilat Gordin Levitan web site)
• Portrait by Marc Chagall on the McGill University Digital Collections Program web site
• "Workbook" on the Asch-Howe Quarrel, on the Hartford, Connecticut, Trinity College web site