Ninette of Sin Street [Hardcover]

Published in Tunis in 1938,Ninette of Sin Streetis one of the first works of Tunisian fiction in French.Ninette's author, Vitalis Danon, arrived in Tunisia under the aegis of the Franco-Jewish organization the Alliance Isra?lite Universelle and quickly adoptedand was adopted bythe local community.

Ninette is an unlikely protagonist: Compelled by poverty to work as a prostitute, she dreams of a better life and an education for her son. Plucky and street-wise, she enrolls her son in the local school and the story unfolds as she narrates her life to the school's headmaster. Ninette's account is both a classic rags-to-riches tale and a subtle, incisive critique of French colonialism. That Ninette's story should still prove surprising today suggests how much we stand to learn from history, and from the secrets of Sin Street.

This volume offers the first English translation of Danon's best-known work. A selection of his letters and an editors' introduction and notes provide context for this cornerstone of Judeo-Tunisian letters.

Any responsible teacher (or serious reader!) of modern Jewish literature already understands the urgency with which we need to find more diverse, compelling narratives that explore Jewish experiences throughout the Sephardi and Mizrahi diasporas. Vitalis Danon'sNinetteseems, in this respect, almost too good to be true: a pioneering, charming Franco-Tunisian novella that manages, like the best monologues of Sholem Aleichem, to present us with the voice of one indefatigable, unforgettable Jewish woman, and through her, the complexities of Jewish life in a North African city. Vitalis Danon(18971957), born in Edirne (Adrianople) in the Ottoman Empire, spent much of his life in Sfax, Tunisia. A novelist, teacher, and school director for the Alliance Isra?lite Universelle, he is best known forNinette of Sin Street, his last work of fiction.Lia Brozgalis Associate Professor of French and FralC4