7. At night in the old market

Up to one-eighth of Poland’s Jewish population barely scratches out a living by setting up stalls in urban markets and selling sundry products, including used clothes and boots, empty bottles, and hot beans. In this most lyrical and moving of Leshchinsky’s essays, he likens the market to a cemetery, the stalls to tombstones, and the impoverished petty merchants to zombies. A visit to the small merchants’ union in Lvov allows Leshchinsky to interview some of the merchants, who plead for miniscule sums of 5 to 25 zloty that might enable them to survive a little longer.