Singer, Israel Joshua

Singer, Israel Joshua, 1893–1944, Polish-American novelist and playwright who wrote in Yiddish, older brother of Isaac Bashevis Singer. Living variously in Poland and Russia, he earned a literary reputation in both countries. His collection of stories Perl un Andere Dertzeylungen (1922; tr. Pearls, 1923) was acclaimed by the New York publisher Abraham Cahan, who hired Singer as Polish correspondent to his Yiddish newspaper the Jewish Daily Forward. Singer's epic masterpiece Di Bruder Ashkenazi (tr. The Brothers Ashkenazi, 1936) details Jewish industrial development before World War I. Singer emigrated to the United States in 1934.

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Singer, Israel Joshua (1893–1944) writer; born in Bilgoray, Poland (brother of Isaac Bashevis Singer). He and his family moved to Warsaw (1908), and he was educated to become a rabbi. By the age of 18 he left home and lived a secular life. He held a series of odd jobs, and studied science, language, mathematics, painting, and writing. During World War I he was conscripted into the Russian army, and worked at forced labor during the German occupation (1915). He moved to Kiev, Russia, where he worked as a proofreader for a Jewish newspaper, and wrote stories and plays before returning to Warsaw (1921). His novel, The Sinner (1933), was well received in America, and he emigrated to New York City (1934). There he wrote novels depicting the conflict between European and American cultures, as in The Family Carnovsky (1943). A master of the Yiddish tradition in America, he is credited for paving the way for his younger brother, Isaac Bashevis Singer.