MOYSHE ITKOVITSH

MOYSHE ITKOVITSH (1902-1986)

Born in Minsk, he was a translator (from Russian to Yiddish), journalist, and bibliographer.  He received a traditional Jewish education.  In his youth he worked as an unskilled laborer in a tobacco factory in Kremenchuk, Ukraine.  In 1918 he returned to Minsk, an activist in the Jewish Communist Youth (Komyug) and involved in self-education. In 1922 he was invited to contribute to the Minsk newspaper Oktyabr (October), in which he placed articles and correspondence pieces.  In 1925 he moved to Moscow where he worked in the Jewish section of the central state publishing house. In 1931 he started working for Emes Publishers, editing works by Sholem-Aleichem, Mendele Moykher-Sforim, and Y.-L. Perets, as well as by Soviet Yiddish writers. He translated numerous textbooks and published in articles, essays, and reviews in the Yiddish press. He also placed work in Eynikeyt (Unity), and in 1961, when Sovetish heymland (Soviet homeland) began to appear in print, he became a regular associate of the editorial board.  He translated: B. B. Grave’s Etyudn tsu der geshikhte funem proletaryat in f.s.s.r. (Studies in the history of the proletariat in the USSR [original: Ocherki istorii proletariata S.S.S.R.]) (Moscow, 1933), 283 pp.; Vladimir ilitsh, zamlung fun artiklen un derinerungen (Vladimir Ilyich, collection of articles and memoirs) [by Gleb Maksimilianovich Krzhizhnovskii] (Moscow, 1934); Geshikhte fun altertum, lernbukh farn 5tn un 6tn klas fun der mitlshul (History of antiquity, textbook for fifth and sixth grade in middle school) [by A. V. Mishulin] (Moscow, 1941), 275 pp.; 20 yor “Sovetish heymland,” biblyografisher ontsayger (Twenty years of Sovetish heymland, bibliographic report), supplement to Sovetish heymland 8 (1981).

 Source: Biblyografisher arkhiv fun der yidisher sovetisher literatur (Bibliographic archive of Soviet Yiddish literature) (YIVO, New York); Sovetish heymland, Materyaln far a leksikon fun der yidisher sovetisher literatur (Material for a handbook of Soviet Yiddish literature), in Sovetish heymland (September 1975-).

 [Additional information from: Chaim Beider, Leksikon fun yidishe shrayber in ratn-farband (Biographical dictionary of Yiddish writers in the Soviet Union), ed. Boris Sandler and Gennady Estraikh (New York: Congress for Jewish Culture, Inc., 2011), pp. 16-17.]