SOURCE: "I. B. Singer's Monologues of Demons," in Prooftexts, Vol. 5, No. 3, September, 1985, pp. 263-68.

In the following essay, Frieden discusses the significance of supernatural dialogue in Singer's fiction, especially as found in "The Mirror" and "The Last Demon." Frieden notes that Singer "employs monologues in a deliberately archaic framework that disturbs our modern conceptions of literary representation and human existence."

Some of Isaac Bashevis Singer's most powerful stories are narrated by demons. Singer employs the literary form of monologue to depict the supernatural world as a reflection of our own. But his unusual device also works allegorically, and carries his fictions far beyond what they superficially represent. On one level, Singer's monologues of demons speak for the repressed or unconscious facets of human experience. At a deeper level, Singer's demonic monologues resemble monologues of the Yiddish language itself. In these stories, the tense relationship between demons and humans...