ABSTRACT

In the 1920s, the study of Early Yiddish language and literature was flourishing. In the heyday of Yiddishism, the leading Yiddish scholars, who were also cultural activists of that movement, not only systematically studied the early texts available to them, but also attempted to acquaint the Yiddish-speaking public with this seemingly almost forgotten cultural heritage. Joseph Opatoshu was one of the ambitious authors who took up this cultural impulse. The novel A tog in Regensburg concerns an important wedding in the Regensburg Jewish community, which takes place some day at the eve of the expulsion of 1519. The original set of characters, the Falstaffian plot elements, and not least the very focus of the novel are obviously inspired by a core component of the Yiddishist historiography of Old Ashkenaz: the so-called Spielmann theory, which rose in the 1920s.