DOVID BROMBERG

DOVID BROMBERG (1915-1998)

            He was a poet, born in the town of Haysyn, Ukraine.  He graduated from the local secondary school and in 1932 came to Moscow to study at the workers’ faculty at the A. S. Bubnov Pedagogical Institute. In 1934 he started working as a proofreader for the newspaper Der emes (The truth). When the newspaper was closed down in 1938, he became a model for artists. He served in the armed forces during WWII. After demobilization, he returned to Moscow and began working as a painter and engraver, which became his primary trade through the end of his life. He debuted in print in 1932 with poems in Zay greyt (Get ready) in Kharkov, and later in other publications, such as Yunge gvardye (Young guard), Der emes, and Farmest (Challenge). In 1935 the compilers of the collection Kinder-shafung (Children’s creation) (Kharkov: Kinder-farlag), Leyb Kvitko and Itsik Grinzayd, chose to include poetry by the young Bromberg. This was followed by a major interruption in his creative work, and he only began publishing again in 1961 when the journal Sovetish heymland (Soviet homeland) began appearing in Moscow. His cycle of poems appeared in the very first issue of this journal. Over the course of subsequent years, he regularly placed poetry, ballads, and stories in this serial. His collection of poems appeared in Russian.

In book form: Elter af a yor, lider, balades, mayselekh (One year older, poems, ballads, stories) (Moscow: Sovetski pisatel, 1977), 158 pp.; Zis un biter, lider, balades, mayselekh: oysgeveylṭe verk (Sweet and bitter, songs, ballads, stories: collected work) (Moscow: Muza tvorchestva, 2004), 195 pp.

Berl Kagan, comp., Leksikon fun yidish-shraybers (Biographical dictionary of Yiddish writers) (New York, 1986), col. 116; and 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. 58-59.