DAY OF PLEASURE

"At a time when in children's literature the power of the imagination isfrequently lost sight of or diluted, it is fortunate that we can honor agreat storyteller. Mr. Singer has created out of remembered fragments ofhis own childhood a place instantly familiar where life is not neat andorderly, where the adventures of a boy throw into sharp and recognizablefocus those resistant elements of the ever-troubled humancondition."--From the judges' citation, National Book Award for Children'sLiterature "Singer's memories of his youth in Poland make a powerful,brilliant children's book. The author lays out a panorama of Jewish lifein the city-- the rabbis in black velvet and gabardine, the shopkeepers,the street urchins and schoolboys, the poverty, the confusion, theexcitement of the prewar time. But even more, the author reveals himself;and the torments and mysteries that plagued him as a child will make hisstories fascinating to other children....Reflecting a bygone world, thephotographs add a further note of realism and power."--The Horn Book