SHLOYME BERLINSKI

SHLOYME BERLINSKI (January 15, 1900-August 14, 1959)

            He was a novelist, born in Kelts (Kielce), Poland.  Until his bar mitzvah, he studied in religious primary school, later leaving to apprentice with a hat maker.  He lived in Lodz and Warsaw, and in 1941 he escaped to Soviet Russia.  From 1946 he was in a Jewish displaced persons camp in Germany and in 1948 moved to Israel.  He debuted in print with a short story in Dos folk (The people) in Warsaw.  He contributed to Lodzher togeblat (Lodz daily newspaper), Folksblat (People’s newspaper) in Lodz, and Haynt (Today), Moment (Moment), Unzer ekspres (Our express), and Literarishe bleter (Literary leaves)—all in Warsaw.  He published his novel Di none (The nun) in Letste nayes (Latest news) in Tel Aviv and in the Forverts (Forward) in New York.  Among his books: Indroysn (Outdoors) (Warsaw: Shklyar, 1930), 160 pp.; Tsu a nayer velt (Toward a new world) (Warsaw: Turem, 1933), 110 pp.; A lebn geyt oyf (A life arises) (Warsaw, 1937), 124 pp., new edition (Munich, 1948); Geklibene dertseylungen (Selected stories) (Minsk, 1941), 232 pp.; A dor fun breyshis (A Genesis generation) (Munich, 1947), 130 pp.; Yerushe, dertseylungen (Heritage, stories) (Buenos Aires: Farband fun poylishe yidn, 1956), 193 pp.; Bilder un dertseylungen (Images and stories) (Tel Aviv: Peretz Publ., 1958), 245 pp.  In Hebrew translation (by others): Beshaḥar ḥaim (At the dawn of life), a translation of A lebn geyt oyf (Tel Aviv, 1950); a collection of his stories entitled Yareaḥ adom (Red moon) (Tel Aviv, 1954).  “Berlinski possesses the writer’s virtue,” noted Shloyme Bikl, “which establishes him among our better and even in certain cases best story-tellers.  Berlinski the story-teller has his own original and fresh graphic quality and, his story breathes with this intensive visuality.  He is a writer with considerable urban refinement and thus so much more familiar, so much more gently familiar in the realm of trees and grass.”  “Asch and [Israel Joshua] Singer,” wrote M. Ravitch, “have written about Lodz from below upwards, indeed from the perspective of the basement darkness….  There are a few like this, one of them being Sh. Berlinski…  Perhaps Berlinski’s short stories were more material than art, more verity than poetry, more truth than lies—I would venture to say.”  He died in Tel Aviv.

Sources: M. Ravitch, Mayn leksikon (My lexicon), vol. 1 (Montreal, 1945); Sh. Bikl, in Tog-morgn zhurnal (New York) (July 7, 1957); Sh. Bikl, Shrayber fun mayn dor (Writers of my generation) (New York, 1958), pp. 339-44; Y. Glatshteyn, in Idisher kemfer (New York) (February 28, 1958); Y. Varshavski [Y. Bashevis], in Forverts (New York) (March 9, 1958); A. Lev, in Yisroel-shtime (Tel Aviv) (March 13, 1958); Y. Keytlman, in Forverts (August 28, 1959)l; G. Mayzl, in Yidishe kultur (New York) 7 (1960).

Berl Kagan, comp., Leksikon fun yidish-shraybers (Biographical dictionary of Yiddish writers) (New York, 1986), cols. 107-8.