FAYVL OSTRINSKI (OSTRINSKY)

FAYVL OSTRINSKI (OSTRINSKY) (May 2, 1907-June 13, 1979)

     Best known by the pseudonym F. Shrager, he was born in Krinki (Krynki), Grodno region.  His father Zalmen and mother Yente (née Efron) belonged to a well-to-do middle stratum in the tannery industry.  He graduated from a Hebrew public school in 1922 in Krynki, and in 1926 from the Hebrew high school in Byalistok.  He emigrated to France in 1927, and studied at the Universities of Grenoble and Nancy.  In 1930 he graduated with a diploma in “commercial engineering” (business administration).  During WWII he was captured by the Germans and escaped.  After his escape, he became a member of central Jewish defense committee in France.  From 1945 he was a representative of the Jewish workers committee in France.  In 1946 and 1948, he visited the United States.  He served as secretary of the organizing committee of the World Jewish Cultural Congress in New York.  From 1951 he was director of the Parisian ORT (Association for the Promotion of Skilled Trades).  He was a member of the managing committees of a number of Jewish organizations and institutions in Paris, a lecturer at the Parisian Jewish public university, and he often appeared on stage at lectures in Belgium, Switzerland, and the United States.  In 1929 he became the editor of the student newspaper Trit (Step) in Nancy (issue no. 2).  From 1932 he was a contributor to the labor press in France.  He served as editor of Yidish hant-bukh, vegvayzer un firer (Jewish handbook, guide and leader) (Paris, 1937), 191 pp.  From 1938 he collaborated with the editorial board of Undzer shtime (Our voice), organ of the Bund in Paris.  In the years 1946-1947 he published articles and pieces of correspondence in Forverts (Forward) in New York.  He translated articles by Léon Blum for the Forverts.  He was the author of the brochure Yidn in frankraykh, fun khurbm tsu oyfboy (Jews in France, from the Holocaust to rebuilding) (New York, 1946), 32 pp.; and the book Afn rand fun tsvey tkufes, zikhroynes (On the edge of two eras, memoirs) (Paris, 1976).  He published frequently in Der veker (The alarm) in New York and lived in Paris.