Burning Lights: A Unique Double Portrait of Russia

This charming memoir by Bella Chagall recalls her childhood in Vitebsk the Russian-Jewish market town where she and her husband Marc Chagall grew up. Her warm reminiscences of Jewish family life in pre-Revolutionary Russia are illustrated with thirty-six pen-and-ink drawings by Marc Chagall. . Bella Chagall a gifted author and actress was the youngest of seven children born to a well-to-do Hasidic family. While living in France in the 1930s the Chagalls conceived the idea of commemorating their native town with a book. The title they chose was Burning Lights an allusion to the festive candles that in their childhood had lit up the holidays of the Jewish year.