Many fans of Sholem Aleichem during the writer’s lifetime would have been not his readers, but his listeners. His stories—originally published in newspapers and literary almanacs—would have been read aloud in Yiddish by one member of the household to the others, or at other intimate gatherings. Sholem Aleichem composed many of his works to be heard; many of his stories were marked by what literary scholars refer to as “orality”—a way of writing fiction so as to convey in printed form the patterns of the spoken word.

Suggested Activity: After reading the short story in printed form, listen to the twenty-minute recording of Sholem Aleichem’s “On Account of a Hat”—without following along in the printed text. Does your experience of listening to the story differ from your impression of reading it on the printed page—and, if so, how? Are the patterns of speech, the intonations of the performer’s voice, and the flow of the narrative on audio similar to how the story “sounded” in your head when you read it on paper? How might your understanding of the story have changed from one way of encountering it to another?