"Bread Givers"

Paper Summary:

This paper tells that "Bread Givers" is the moving story of one young woman's struggle to make something of herself in a new country. She struggles against the old world ideals of her family, especially her father, who hangs on to his native customs even though he has come to America to better his family's lives. The paper examines the concepts of nativism and nation in the book.

From the Paper:

"Bread Givers," as with most of Yezierska's works, is semi-autobiographical. Like her heroine Sara, Yezierska came to America when she was young, lived on the Lower East Side in the Jewish Ghetto of New York, and constantly pushed herself to work hard, write, and rise above her beginnings. One critic writes, "Yezierska's works chronicle the lives of Jewish immigrants in America, in particular the struggles of Jewish women to escape drudgery and realize their dreams. She was critical of the patriarchal religious culture of Orthodox Judaism that transported old-world oppression to America" (Bloom 160). In addition, the introduction to this new printing of her novel states, "Her constant themes are the dirt and congestion of the tenement, the struggle against poverty, family, and tradition to break out of the ghetto, and then the searing recognition that her roots would always lie in the old world" (Kessler-Harris xvi)."

More papers on "Bread Givers":

• Book Review # 50041 : "Bread Givers"
• Analytical Essay # 48713 : "Bread Givers" by Anzia Yezierska"
• Essay # 46073 : "Bread Givers"
• Analytical Essay # 42675 : "Bread Givers"

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