A Simple Story

A small town in Jewish Galicia is the scene of a bitter-sweet romance at the beginning of the 20th century when Blume Nacht, a young orphaned girl, comes to live as a maid at the home of her wealthy relatives, triggering a complex series of events in the life of her sensitive young cousin Hirshl. Few of Agnon’s stories are told as effortlessly as A Simple Story , yet this engaging tale reveals the profound psychological and social insights of his finest fiction. Includes new preface and an annotated bibliography of literary criticism. Revised translation by Hillel Halkin. The New York Review of Books surveys The Toby Press S.Y. Agnon Library in “The Great Genius of Jewish Literature”