AVROM GELLER

AVROM GELLER

            He was born in Tismenits (Tysmienica), Galicia.  He was a wedding entertainer and travelled around the world.  For a time he lived in Transvaal, South Africa, and there, as he recounts in the introduction to his booklet of rhymes, Lamenatseyekh, a zamlung fun farsheydene maymorim, shirim, milse dibdikhese (To the victor, a collection of various articles, poems, humorous phrases) (New York, 1900), 124 pp., it was “published in Transvaal, proofread in Ecuador, the poet from the Philippines, and the entertainer from Alaska.”  He later came to the United States and continued with his work as a wedding entertainer.  He lived in Brooklyn where Lamenatseyekh was published, with a second preface written by the author in 1899.  The booklet included rhymes that such an entertainer would use in Yiddish and Hebrew with translations into English on themes of the occasion, such as: high holidays, circumcision, engagement parties, and the like.  In one poem, the author complains that he is speaking English: “What I use only English to speak, I should tell you, so that you won’t complain.  It’ll help refresh my memory.”  In a second poem, he describes the poverty of the Orthodox rabbinate at that time.  Other themes of the text: “Khave mit der shlang” (Eve and the snake [serpent])—a dialogue; “Di falshe hofenung” (The false hope), and the like.  Geller rhymed Yiddish with English, and Yiddish with Hebrew: “Dat doz eksplen / di meynung fun pidyen haben” (That does explain the meaning of redemption of the first born); or “Dos seyfer ‘lamenatseyekh’ iz do / veze roe vekoro” (There’s the book Lamenatseyekh, and you can see it and read it).  In the booklet, Geller also published poems by A. Margolis (see Zalmen Reyzen, Leksikon, vol. 2; and Z. Zilbertsvayg, Leksikon fun yidishn teater [Handbook of the Yiddish theater], vol. 2.  He also authored a play entitled Der nayer yid (The new Jew), a drama in four acts (Brooklyn, 1913), 135 pp.