SOURCE: "Yitzhok Leib Peretz: On the Fiftieth Anniversary of His Death," in Jewish Book Annual, Vol. 22, 1964-1965, pp. 78-84.

In the following essay, Knox offers an appreciation of Pereti's stories.

Mendele, Peretz, and Sholem Aleichem are regarded as the three "masters" of modern Yiddish literature, and curiously enough a "tag of identification" has been attached to each—satirist, romanticist, humorist. Such "labels," if taken literally, can be misleading and constricting, yet if taken seriously, can be useful in providing a guide-line to an author.

Granted that Mendele is a satirist, he is a satirist who hates with a kind of love. The paradox ceases to be puzzling if the tenses are put in proper order: the satirist is dissatisfied with the state of affairs as it is because he believes it can be better tomorrow if we will it; he is critical of the present, but only for...