THE REBBE'S DAUGHTER: Memoir of a Hasidic Childhood

This rare woman's perspective on Hasidism at the start of the 20th century is the spiritual memoir of Shapiro (1894–1971), daughter of the Rebbe of Kozienice, Poland. Written in the third person under the name "Bat-Zion" (daughter of Zion), the autobiography that appears at first glance to be fiction focuses on Shapiro's life at age 11 and 12, her biological maturation, her impending marriage at 14 and her curiosity about Hasidic spirituality and Kabbalah. She immerses her readers in an ethereal world of holiness, mirrored by languorous and sensory evocations of nature and "literary meditations" that often dominate the plot. Polen masterfully translates Shapiro's lush descriptions, which offer an insider's view of a Hasidic master's family: the pungent smell of garlic and goose flesh; the fragrance of rose-scented soap; the taste of fresh raisin cakes; the sounds of chopping wood, quivering violins and sacred singing; visions of cold blue air and snow sparkling on rooftops. In contrast to the stereotype of women in traditional Jewish society, Shapiro portrays women as scholars of Torah, transmitters of tradition and exemplars of piety, though their role in religious life is limited. Shapiro wrote the memoir in Israel, where she settled in 1926, which saved her from the Holocaust that claimed the lives of many of her family members. Readers interested in the world of spirituality will appreciate the deep devotion Shapiro embodies even as she creates an elegy for a way of life that has disappeared. (May)