Head of New Yiddish Rep Secures Rights to Classic Novel CALL IT SLEEP

Benjamin Feldman, executive producer and chairman of the board for New Yiddish Rep, has secured all Yiddish translation rights to Henry Roth's 1934 classic CALL IT SLEEP. The landmark agreement covers all published print and electronic editions of the legendary work, as well as any potential stage adaptations in Yiddish.

Upon its publication in 1934, CALL IT SLEEP was universally hailed as a modernist masterpiece reminiscent of the work of James Joyce, as well as the first realistic portrayal of immigrant life in New York City. In a highly odd twist, sales of the book were lackluster and it subsequently went out of print for nearly 30 years. In 1960, Jewish literary critics Irving Howe proclaimed CALL IT SLEEP as both an American and Jewish classic, leading to the book becoming republished. But it was the 1964 paperback edition that secured CALL IT SLEEP's legendary status which still holds today. Irving Howe's review of the book in The New York Times Book Review marked the first time a paperback review appeared on the front page. The novel was included on Time Magazine's 2005 list of the 100 best English-language novels written since 1923.

Benjamin Feldman's acquisition of the Yiddish language rights marks a major step forward in the publishing history of this magnificent story of a "dangerously imaginative" young man coming of age in the slums of New York. According to Feldman, "With the translation of CALL IT SLEEP into Yiddish, I and my translator will tell the world how Henry Roth spoke to himself, sotto voce, as he pounded the keyboard and created a novel that Lis Harris described in The New York Times as 'surely the most lyrically authentic novel in American literature about young boy's coming of age.' I beg to differ only slightly with Ms. Harris: It is only with the translation into Yiddish that the optimal authenticity will be achieved. Roth grew up in Yiddish, spoke Yiddish, wrote in Yiddish with English words. But with the moribundity of the language in non-Hasidic communities, we have lost a great opportunity. This is my project, one of restoration to its rightful place. And I am honored by Henry's son Hugh to have him place his trust in me."