BERL BRODER

BERL BRODER (1815-1868)

This was the literary name used by Ber Margulis.  He was born in Brod (Brody), eastern Galicia, a singer and composer of songs.  He was the father of the Broder Singers.  His family was one of poor merchants who dealt in clay and brick.  As a youngster, he was orphaned on his father’s side.  He worked with pigs’ hair and while working would compose songs.  He married at age twenty-five and became the representative of a major export firm.  During his business trips in Russia, he would sing songs at the inns.  There gradually grew up around him a group of former wedding entertainers and singers from cantorial choirs, and he organized the first group of folksingers—the Broder Singers.  “They were the first,” according to Yitskhok Shiper, “to assume the holiday mantle of folk drama and to begin to produce it in simple everyday manner.”  Broder abandoned his business and threw himself totally into his new calling.  He not only published songs, but he acted out roles and for a short time became quite popular.  People everywhere sang his songs.  For several years, he visited a series of larger cities in Russia.  When he returned to Brod, he performed in a guesthouse.  He gave performances in other cities in Galicia and Romania as well.  He died in Jassy.

According to other sources, he was born in Pidkamen (Podkamień); his father was said to have been a teacher of very young children and an assistant in a religious elementary school.  He had to marry at a young age, and he quickly divorced his wife and took off to look for fun in Jassy, Romania.  He later returned to Brod, married a second time, settled in Pidkamen, and began roaming about like a troubadour.  He only transcribed a small portion of all his songs.  A small collection appeared in print in Pressburg (1860?), entitled Shire zmira, draysik herlikhe lider in reyn yidish loshn (Singing songs, thirty splendid songs in pure Yiddish) (second printing, twenty-six songs, Lemberg, 1964), 125 pp.; a later edition with thirty songs appeared in Warsaw (1882), 96 pp.; and other editions as well.  His work was included in: Di eltere yidishe literatur (The older Yiddish literature) (Kiev, 1929); Der arbeter in der yidisher literatur, fargesene lider (The worker in Yiddish literature, forgotten poems) (Moscow, 1939).

Broder was one of the first Jewish folk poets of the nineteenth century.  His songs were on the whole monologues of a shepherd, a peddler, a miner, a synagogue beadle, a watercarrier, a wagon driver, a cantor, an itinerant teacher, a matchmaker, an itinerant preacher, and the like.

Sources: Zalmen Reyzen, Leksikon, vol. 1; Z. Zilbertsvayg, Teater-leksikon, vol. 1; M. L. Petshenik, in Literarishe bleter 55 (1925); Nokhum Shtif, Di eltere yidishe literatur (Older Yiddish literature) (Kiev, 1929), pp. 75-81; N. M. Gelber, Toldot yehude brodi (History of the Jews of Brod) (Jerusalem, 1955), pp. 227-29.

[Additional information from: Berl Kagan, comp., Leksikon fun yidish-shraybers (Biographical dictionary of Yiddish writers) (New York, 1986), col. 114.]