BOREKH GELMAN

BOREKH GELMAN (1910-June 1941)

            He was born in Vidz, Vilna region, into a poor home of a village tailor.  He studied in the Vidz secular Jewish school.  Graduating in 1926, he took on an apprenticeship with a craftsman.  On December 16, 1927, he published his first work, a poem, “Mir kleyne, yunge arbeter” (We small, young workers), in the children’s supplement to Naye folks-tsaytung (New people’s newspaper) in Warsaw: Kleyne folkstsaytung (Littler people’s newspaper), no. 48.  From that point in time, his poems regularly appeared in Kleyne folkstsaytung and Yugnt-veker (Youth alarm) in Warsaw, 1928-1934; and from time to time, in Di naye folks-tsaytung (The new people’s newspaper), 1931-1937; Vokhnshrift (Weekly writings), 1931-1937; Foroys (Onward) and Kinder-fraynt (Children’s friend), 1930; Literarishe bleter (Literary leaves) and Vilner tog (Vilna day), in which he also frequently published correspondence pieces on life in Vidz, 1928-1937.  In 1935 he attended the YIVO conference in Vilna, where he became close friends with the Young Vilna writers’ group, and especially with Mikhl Natish from Sventsyan (Svencionys).  After Natish’s death, he published articles and poems about him in Naye folkstsaytung and Yugnt-veker in 1937.  Late in 1936 he moved to Warsaw, where in 1937 he published his only book; it contained thirty-nine songs and poems: Velt un tsoym (World and fence), 115 pp.  In September 1939 during the Nazi assault on Warsaw, he succeeded in returning to Vidz.  When the Nazis closed in on the town in 1941, a pogrom broke out.  Among the eighty victims were Gelman and his five brothers and sisters.

Sources: A, Mark, in Foroys (Warsaw) (May 27, 1938); Sh. Katsherginski, Khurn vilne (The Holocaust in Vilna) (New York, 1947), p. 183; B. Heler, Dos lid iz geblibn (This poem remains) (Warsaw, 1951), pp. 64-74; Lerer-yizker-bukh (Memorial volume for teachers) (New York, 154), p. 107.