DOVID HOFSHTEYN (DAVID HOFSTEIN)

DOVID HOFSHTEYN (DAVID HOFSTEIN) (June 24, 1889-August 12, 1952)

            He was a poet, prose author, and playwright, born in Korostishev (Korostyshiv), Kiev Province, Ukraine.  His father Nekhemye, an employee in the timber business, was a learned Jew; his mother descended from the family of the well-known folk musician Pedutser-Kholodenko (Dovid’s sister Shifre, a Yiddish poet, took her mother maiden name as a pseudonym). The family later moved the Volhynian village of Yasnogorod, where they had their own eight desyatina [one desyatina = roughly 2.7 acres] of land, and he and his family worked it.  At age five Hofshteyn was turned over to a religious primary school, and at age nine he left to live and study with his grandfather, Rabbi Akivele, who was an elementary school teacher in Korostyshiv.  At the same time he studied Russian and Hebrew for two years with a private tutor.  He then left to rejoin his parents in the village, spent two years studying with a teacher imported from Zhitomir, and then worked in the village economy, just like his ten younger brothers and sisters.  At age seventeen he became a teacher in a neighboring village and continued his education on his own.  In 1907 he moved to Kiev, went through the sixth class in high school as an external student, went on to serve in the military (1912-1913). He then returned to Kiev where he passed the baccalaureate examination and married Hinde-Gitl Khayet. He later studied in a Kiev commercial institute, and audited lectures in the philology faculty of the University of Kiev. His wife died in 1920, and he was left with their two children.

He began writing poetry at age nine, initially in Hebrew, and later (under the pen name D. Naumov) in Russian and Ukrainian, as well as in Yiddish, in which he debuted in print in 1917 in the Kiev newspaper Naye tsayt (New time); his first piece was a study entitled “Fun dorf” (From the village) which appeared on September 28, and thereafter a poem “Di nase nets fun tribun khezhvn-tsayt” (The wet net of the tribune of Heshvan) on October 23. From that time forward, he contributed work to a variety of Yiddish literary publications and assumed a leading position in Jewish literary life, was one of the administrators of “Kultur-lige” (Culture league), a lecturer in literature and drama studios, editor of a series of poetry publications, and contributed to the anthologies Eygns (One’s own, 1918-1920), Oyfgang (Afresh, 1919), and Baginen (Dawn, 1919). He was later to be one of the founders and the editor at the publishing house Vidervuks (Renewal), which brought out a series of pedagogical collections for young Yiddish poets, and he wrote prefaces to a number of these anthologies. He also edited the children’s magazines Shretelekh (Elves) and Kling-klang (Cling-clang) and Moyshe Khashtshevatski’s collection of translations from Russian poets. Over the years 1919-1922, he brought six collections of poetry—the first being Bay vegn (At the road) (Kiev, 1919). In late 1920 he moved to Moscow, was selected to join the management of the Moscow circle (later, union) of Jewish writers and artists, and he was one of the editors of Shtrom (Current). In the declaration of the Shtrom group (see its second number), he proclaimed it was a specimen of “the calling of literature in the revolutionary era.” In early 1922, he signed—together with Nokhum Oyslender, Shmuel Godiner, Yekhezkl Dobrushin, and Avrom Vevyorke—a reply to Moyshe Litvakov’s attack on Moscow Yiddish writers who conducted themselves, according to Litvakov’s complaint, with contempt concerning cooperation with the newspaper Der emes (The truth) which Litvakov edited. In 1923 Hofshteyn placed his signature on a memorandum to the government in protest against the persecutions of Hebrew, and this led to conflict with the Communist “Yidsektsye” (Jewish section). The general assembly of Jewish literary and artistic leaders in Moscow expressed “its deepest regrets that, under the memorandum concerning Hebrew. we find the signature of the poet Dovid Hofshteyn. We hold that as a result he has excluded himself from the family of Jewish cultural leaders.” The editorial board of Shtrom removed him from the editors.

Not seeing any prospects for himself, Hofshteyn left Russian in 1923 and moved for a short period of time to Berlin. During this time, he published poems in the New York journal Di tsukunft (The future), among them the dramatic poem, “Shoyl, der letste meylekh fun yisroel” (Saul, the last king of Israel) (July 1924); the slapstick “Meshiekhs tsaytn” (Messianic times) (May 1925); and translations of Pushkin (January 1925) and of Dubnova-Erlich’s “Muter-lider” (Mother poems) (September 1923), among others. In all, he composed five plays while in Berlin, only three of which were published. He did publish in Berlin a poetry collection entitled In tovl fun vent (On the tableau on the walls), but he found no appropriate atmosphere for his work in Germany. In April 1925, he moved with his second wife, Feyge Biberman, to the Land of Israel, and published Hebrew poetry in the Israeli press—Haarets (The land), Davar (Word), Kuntres (Booklet), Hapoel hatsair (The young worker), Sefer hashana shel erets-yisrael (Yearbook for Israel) for 1925, Hadim (Echoes), and Shabesdike baylages fun davar (Sabbath supplements for Davar), in which, among other items, he published chapters of memoirs concerning the poet Osher Shvartsman. His moods at the time are captured in the words of his preface, written in Tel Aviv, to a booklet of poems by the Hebrew-Yiddish poet Yankev-Dovid Kozman (1900-1980): “I wish I could believe that the tremendous shocks and pains of the last years brought newly cemented currents into our people’s psyche and the old national borders were just a little erased. The sense of a general Jewish self-knowledge would deepen and, as in all difficult times strengthen itself, now purely mystical moods would…withdraw from all cabalisms the threads of joy and life’s ecstasy, and transcend all barriers that separate in our lonely Jewish life one people from another.” He apparently felt lonely in Israel and was drawn to return to Russia, where he had left his two sons, Shammai and Hillel—see Hofshteyn’s poem “Kegure zevim” (Like wolf-cubs), in Hapoel hatsair (Tel Aviv) 19 (1925-1926), p. 5.

So, he returned to Moscow and worked there in the Sholem-Aleichem drama studio. His difficult economic situation, especially after his wife gave birth to a daughter, brought him to the decision that he had to return to Russia. On April 26, 1926, he published a letter of remorse in Emes, in which he stressed that he wanted “to resume his place among those who are building the life of Jewish working masses in the Soviet Union.” And, that April 26, at a meeting of Moscow Yiddish writers, he repented his signature on the memorandum on behalf of Hebrew, and the meeting accepted a resolution in which was written: “An opportunity has been established for joint work with the Hofshteyns.” At the end of 1926, his signature was placed beneath the declaration of “association of revolutionary Jewish writers in Ukraine,” who declared, among other things, that “all remnants of nationalistic aftereffects must be exterminated.” He was one of the initiating group which issued an appeal “to all Jewish revolutionary writers in Ukraine” concerning joining the All-Ukrainian Union of Proletarian Writers (VUSP"P) and founding a Jewish section in it. At the first conference of Jewish Proletarian Writers, in Ukraine (1927), he was selected for the office of the Jewish section of VUSP"P, and when they began publishing the organ of their group, the monthly Prolit (Proletarian literature), in March 1928, he joined the editorial board. But, then a new controversy arose at the meeting with the incitement campaign against Leyb Kvitko—known in the history of Yiddish literature in the Soviet Union as “storybook-Kvitko,” when he published a cycle of “caricatures” which were qualified as a political performance against the party leadership, an “expression of rightwing assault in literature.” In October 1929, the Jewish section of VUSP"P adopted a resolution in connection with this conflict in which it was said that “Hofshteyn’s recent errors demonstrate that, while in a proletarian writers organization, he had not liquidated his past petty bourgeois nationalistic viewpoint,” and he was expelled from VUSP"P. Similar incidents with writers organizations took place with Hofshteyn in subsequent years, but this did not undercut his active creative work. As earlier, he took an active part in the life of a man of letters, published his poems, translated, and published (together with other writers, pedagogues, and literary scholars) textbooks for Jewish schools—readers on Yiddish language and literature, together with Y Yakhinson and Elye Spivak; a volume entitled Teorye fun literatur, poetik (Theory of literature, poetics), together with Fume Shames; and a drama for children Spartak (Spartacus).

Aside from poetry, dramas, and translations, he was working on prose works—e.g., a chapter from his autobiographical novel Yorn (Years) was published in the journal Farmest (Competition) 5-6 (in Kiev). He also published translations of Der soykher fun venedik (The Merchant of Venice) by Shakespeare for the Kiev Yiddish State Theater and Nora by Ibsen for the Odessa Yiddish State Theater, among other works. In 1939 Hofshteyn’s fiftieth birthday was celebrated; he was decorated by the Soviet government with an honorary distinction, and the state publishing house translated a book of his Yiddish poetry in his honor into Russian, entitled Novye prostory (New scope). Overall, Hofshteyn translated a great deal from Russian, Ukrainian, and German, especially works of the Ukrainian poet Shevchenko.  He also co-edited an anthology of Yiddish literature in Ukrainian.

            During the years of WWII, Hofshteyn was a member of the Jewish Anti-Fascist Committee.  From July 1941 until August 1944, he lived in Ufa, the capital of Bashkiria, and published poems in the newspaper Eynikeyt (Unity), as well as in other serial publications. He returned to Kiev, and in 1946 he was honored by the government with a medal “for heroism” at a time of war, completed a play entitled Muter (Mother), and in 1948 the Moscow publisher “Der emes” brought out a volume of his Oysgeveylte verk (Selected works). Thus ended the story of the creative path of one of the groundbreaking and active builders of Soviet Yiddish literature. He was arrested on September 16, 1948—the first of the Yiddish writers connected with the sad, celebrated “affair of the Jewish Anti-Fascist Committee.” He was one of thirteen sentenced to death and was shot on August 12, 1952. In 1987 Feyge Biberman-Hofshteyn established the Dovid Hofshteyn Prize for Literature and Art, which the union of Jewish writers and journalists in Israel give out annually on the day of the poet’s birth.

His writings include the following: Bay vegn (Kiev: Kiever farlag, 1919), 93 pp.; Royte blitn (Red flowers) (Kiev: Kultur-lige, 1920), 30 pp.; Fun kinder-yorn (From childhood years) (Kiev: Kultur-lige, 1920), 31 pp.; A mayse mit a kholem (A story with a dream), a play in two scenes, with Yekhezkl Dobrushin (Kiev, 1920), 19 pp.; Zunen-shleyfn (Temples of suns) (Kiev: State Publ., 1921), 23 pp.; Ginen-geveb (Fabric of trust) (Kiev: State Publ., 1921), 16 pp.; Troyer (Grief) (Kiev: Kultur-lige, 1922), 28 pp.; Valger-shteyger (Rolling) (Kharkov, 1922), 80 pp.; In tovl fun vent (Berlin: Funken, 1923), 60 pp.; Lirik (Lyric), vol. 1 of Gezamlte verk (Collected works) (Kiev: Kultur-lige, 1923), 185 pp.; Shtam-azkore (Root-memorial for the dead), poetry (Moscow: Shtrom, 1924), 15 pp., with Arn Kushnirov; Bay vegn (Vilna: B. A. Kletskin, 1924), 174 pp.; Af likhtike ruinen (On bright ruins) (Moscow: Shul un bukh, 1927), 160 pp.; Literatur-kentenish (Knowledge of literature), poetics, part 1, elements of rhythm and style, with Fume Shames (Moscow: Central People’s Publishers, 1928), second printing (1929); Arbetshul, khrestomatye farn tsveytn lernyor (Workers’ school, reader for the second school year) (Kiev: Kultur-lige, 1928), 295 pp., second edition (1929); Arbetshul, khrestomatye farn dritn lernyor (Workers’ school, reader for the third school year) (Kiev: Kultur-lige, 1928), 320 pp., second edition (1929); Arbetshul, khrestomatye farn fertn lernyor (Workers’ school, reader for the fourth school year) (Kiev: Kultur-lige, 1928), 358 pp.—all “readers” with Y. Yakhinson and Elye Spivak; Literatur-kentenish far der arbeter-shul (Knowledge of literature for the workers’ school) (Kharkov, 1929), 96 pp., with Fume Shames; Fun ale mayne veltn (From all my worlds), third collection (Kharkov: State Publ., 1929), 203 pp.; Spartak, heroic drama in four acts (Minsk: Byelorussian State Publishers, 1929), 49 pp.; Gezamlte verk, vol. 1 (Moscow, 1930), 274 pp.; Teorye fun literatur, poetik (Kharkov: Ukrainian State Publishers, 1930), with Fume Shames; Geklibene lider (Selected poems) (Kharkov: Central People’s Publishers, 1931), 256 pp.; Freyd fun nayem zayn (Joy of the new existence), fourth collection (Moscow: Emes, 1933), 141 pp.; Orkestra (Orchestra) (Kharkov: Literatur un kunst, 1933), 163 pp.; Navigatsye (Navigation), poems for children (Moscow: Emes, 1934), 23 pp.; Lider (Poems) (Kiev: State Literary Publishers, 1935), 201 pp.; Far kinder (For children), poetry (Kiev: Ukrainian State Publishers for National Minorities, 1935), 52 pp.; Kiev (Kiev), poem (Kiev: Ukrainian State Publishers for National Minorities, 1936), 49 pp.; Geklibene lider (Kiev: Ukrainian State Publishers for National Minorities, 1937), 225 pp.; Birobidzhan (Birobidzhan), poetry (Kiev: Ukrainian state publishers for national minorities, 1938), 6 pp.; Lider un poemes (Poetry) (Kiev: State Literary Publishers, 1939), 209 pp.; Mayn vunderlekh land (My wonderful country) (Kiev, 1939), 27 pp.; In undzere teg (In our days) (Kiev: Ukrainian State Publishers for National Minorities, 1939), 190 pp.; Geklibene lider (Kiev: State Literary Publishers, 1940), 238 pp.; Der hiltserne lefl (The wooden spoon), children’s poem (Kiev: State Literary Publishers, 1940), 14 pp.; Ikh gleyb (I believe) (Moscow: Emes, 1944), 64 pp.; Ikh gloyb (I believe) (New York: IKUF, 1945), 159 pp.; Muter, a drama (1947), according to an announcement in Eynikeyt; Geklibene verk (Selected works), poetry covering the years 1912-1944 (Moscow: Emes, 1948), 383 pp.; Oysgeklibene shriftn (Selected writings), poetry, with Izzy Kharik and Itzik Fefer (Buenos Aires: Lifshits-fond, 1962), 266 pp.; Geklibene verk (Moscow: Sovetski pisatel, 1968), comp. Feyge Hofshteyn and Sh. Kholodenka, 375 pp.; Lider un poemes (Tel Aviv: Yisroel-bukh, 1977), 2 vols.; and in Hebrew, Zikhron dami heveti (I brought the memory of my blood) (Tel Aviv: Reshafim, 1984), 140 pp.

Hofshteyn translated the following: Leonid Andreev’s Petka af datshe (Petko in his dacha [original: Petko na dachie] (Kiev: Kiever farlag, 1919), 19 pp.; Andreev, Petka af zumer-voynung (Fetko at the summer dwelling [original: Pietko na letnisku]) (Kiev: Kultur-lige, 1921), 25 pp.; Upton Sinclair, Shmuel der emes-zukher (Samuel the searcher for truth [original Samuel the Seeker]) (Kiev, 1928); Henri Barbusse, Emese geshikhtes (True stories) (Kiev: Ukrainian State Publishers for National Minorities, 1932), 153 pp.; Ivan Andrienko, In nayem veg (On a new route) (Kiev: Ukrainian State Publishers for National Minorities, 1932), 121 pp.; N. F. Arayev, Brak in giseray (Trash in the foundry) (Kharkov, 1933), 44 pp.; V. Vinichenko, Hunger (Hunger) (Kharkov, 1933), 26 pp.; N. Tokunaga (Tokunaga Sunao 徳永直), Di gas on zun (The street without sun [Taiyō no nai machi 太陽のない街]) (Kharkov: Ukrainian State Publishers for National Minorities, 1933), 193 pp.; Jean Molière, Der birger, der adlman (The bourgeois, the nobleman [original: Bourgeois gentilhomme]) (Kharkov, 1934), 107 pp.; Pierre Augustin Caron de Beaumarchais, Der meshugener tog, oder figaros khasene (The crazy day, or Figaro’s wedding [original: La folle journée, ou, Le mariage de Figaro]) (Kharkov, 1934, 1937), 174 pp.; A. A. Khvylia, Taras shevtshenko, der groyser demokrat, der dikhter-revolutsyoner (Taras Shevchenko, the great democrat, the poet-revolutionary [original: Taras Shevchenko, velikii demokrat, poet-revoliutsioner]) (Kiev: Ukrainian Academy of Sciences, 1935), 143 pp.; D. Furmanov, Tshapayev (Chapayev [original: Chapaev])[1] (Moscow: Emes, 1935), 204 pp.; V. Kuzmitsh, Fligl (Wing) (Kharkov-Kiev: Ukrainian State Publishers for National Minorities, 1935), 447 pp.; L. Rubinshteyn, A dertseylung vegn 47 soldatn (A story of forty-seven soldiers) (Kiev: Ukrainian State Publishers for National Minorities, 1935), 182 pp.; Aleksandr Pushkin, Dubrovski (Dubrovski) (Moscow: Emes, 1935), 157 pp.; Pushkin, Belkins dertseylungen (Belkin’s tales [Povesti Belkina]) (Moscow: Emes, 1935), 141 pp.; Friedrich Schiller, Intrige un libe (Intrigue and love [original: Kabale und Liebe]) (Berdichev: Ukrainian State Publishers for National Minorities, 1936), 130 pp.; Ivan Franko, Geklibene verk (Kiev: Ukrainian State Publishers for National Minorities, 1936), 142 pp.; Pushkin, Dramatishe verk (Dramatic works) (Kiev: Ukrainian State Publishers for National Minorities, 1937), 266 pp.; Pushkin, A zaverukhe (A blizzard [original: Metelʹ]) (Kiev: Ukrainian State Publishers for National Minorities, 1937), 30 pp.; Lesia Ukrainka, Geklibene verk (Kiev: Ukrainian State Publishers for National Minorities, 1938), 167 pp.; Taras Shevchenko, Geklibene lider (Selected poetry) (Moscow: Emes, 1939), 133 pp.; Shevchenko, Geklibene verk (Kiev: Ukrainian State Publishers for National Minorities, 1939), 254 pp.; Shevchenko, A shpatsir mit fargenign un nit on moral (A walk with joy and not without morality [original: Prohuli︠a︡nka iz zadovolenniam ta ne bez morali]) (Kiev: Ukrainian State Publishers for National Minorities, 1939), 237 pp.; Shevchenko, Lider (Poems) (Odessa: Children’s Publishers, 1939), 60 pp.

He edited and compiled, among others, the following: Felker zingen (People sing), together with Itsik Fefer (Kiev: Ukrainian State Publishers for National Minorities, 1939), 412 pp.; the poetry of Vladimir Mayakovsky, with Moyshe Khashchevatski (Kiev, 1940), 157 pp.  He rewrote into modern Yiddish Yitskhok-Avrom Eykhel’s Reb henekh oder vos tut men damit (Reb Henikh, or what is to be done?); and Arn-Hale Volfzon (Aaron Wolfssohn), Laykhtzin un fremelay (Frivolity and piety), a comedy from the Berlin Enlightenment (Kiev: State Publ., 1933).  A volume of Hofshteyn’s poetry in Russian translation, with an introduction by Arn Vergelis, was published in Moscow in 1958 (with a bibliography).

            His work was included in: Af barikadn, revolyutsyonere shlakhtn in der opshpiglung fun der kinstlerisher literatur (At the barricades, revolutionary battles in the lens of artistic literature) (Kharkov: Central Publishers, 1930); Ruf, lider zamlung (Call, poetry collection) (Minsk: Byelorussian State Publishers, 1935); Birebidzhan (Birobidzhan) (Kharkov: State Publ., 1936); In fayerdikn doyer, zamlung fun revolutsyonere lirik, in di nayer yidisher dikhtung (In fiery duration, a collection of revolutionary lyrics in the new Yiddish poetry) (Kiev: State Publ., 1921); Oktyabr-zamlung (October anthology) (Kharkov: Ukrainian State Publishers, 1925); Almanakh, fun yidishe sovetishe shrayber tsum alfarbandishn shrayber-tsuzamenfor (Almanac, from Soviet Jewish writers to the all-Soviet conference of writers) (Kharkov: Ukrainian State Publishers for National Minorities, 1934); Deklamater fun der sovetisher yidisher literatur (Reciter of Soviet Yiddish literature) (Moscow: Emes, 1934); Lider vegn stalinen (Poems about Stalin) (Kiev: State Publ., 1937); Far der bine, dertseylungen, pyeses, lider (For the stage: stories, plays, poems), with musical notation (together with Yekhezkl Dobrushin and Elye Gordon) (Moscow: Central People’s Publishers, 1929); Farn heymland in shlakht! (For the homeland in battle!) (Moscow: Emes, 1941); Komyug, literarish-kinstlerisher zamlbukh ([Jewish] Communist Youth, literary-artistic anthology) (Moscow: Emes, 1938); Tsum zig (To victory) (Moscow: Emes, 1944); Shlakhtn (Battles) (Kharkov: Ukrainian State Publishers for National Minorities, 1932); Lomir zingen (Let’s sing) (Moscow: Emes, 1940); Komsomolye (Communist Youth) (Kiev: Ukrainian State Publishers for National Minorities, 1938); Lenin un di kinder (Lenin and the children) (Kharkov-Kiev: Ukrainian State Publishers for National Minorities, 1934); Sholem-aleykhem zamlung (Sholem-Aleykhem anthology) (Kiev, 1919); Yugnt (Youth) (Kharkov: Komyug, 1922); Lider (Poetry) (Riga, 1941).

[1] N.B. WorldCat ascribes this translation to “Yoysef Rubin”—JAF.

  

Sources: Zalmen Reyzen, Leksikon, vol. 1; Shmuel Niger, in Tsukunft (New York) (December 1921; February 1930); Niger, in Literarishe bleter (Warsaw) (April 29 and October 14, 1927; Niger, Habikoret uveayoteha (Inquiry and its problems) (Jerusalem, 1957), p. 348; Niger, Yidishe shrayber in sovet-rusland (Yiddish writers in Soviet Russia) (New York, 1958), pp. 49-55; Literaturnaya entsiklopediya (Literary encyclopedia) (Mos cow, 1929), pp. 682-84; Daniel Charney, in Literarishe bleter (January 21, 1927); Bal-Makhshoves, in Tsukunft (August 1928); Y. Pat, in Vokhshrift far literatur (Warsaw) (November 6, 1931); A. Avtshuk, Etyudn un materialn tsu der geshikhte fun der yidisher literatur bavegung in FSRR (Studies and material for the history of the Yiddish literature movement in the Soviet Union) (Kharkov, 1934), pp. 25, 37, 44, 50-54, 133, 134; A. Pomerants, Inzhenyern fun neshomes (Engineers of souls) (New York, 1943), p. 34; Pomerants, Der tragisher goyrl fun di yidishe shrayber in sovet-rusland (The tragic fate of the Yiddish writers in Soviet Russia) (New York, 1957); Pomerants, “Byo-biblyografishe notitsn” (Bio-bibliographical notices), in Niger, Yidishe shrayber (see above), pp. 459-60; Dr. A. Mukdoni, in Eynikeyt (New York) (November-December 1945); N. Y. Gotlib, Sovetishe shrayber (Soviet writers) (Montreal, 1945); Y. Botoshanski, in Di naye tsayt (Buenos Aires) (July 6, 1951); A. Golomb, in Zamlbikher (New York) 8 (1952), pp. 249-56; L. Khinkulov, Slovnyk ukraïnsʹkoï literatury (Glossary of Ukrainian literature) (Kiev, 1946); Yankev Glatshteyn, in Idisher kemfer (New York) November 23, 1956); Glatshteyn, in In tokh genumen (In essence) (New York, 1956), pp. 39-49; Y. G., “Meshorer sheyarad eli gardom” (The poet who descended to the gallows), Maariv (Tel Aviv) (April 27, 1956); Y. Yanasovitsh, in Der holts-industriel (The timber industry) (Buenos Aires, 1956), pp. 177-94; Yanasovitsh, Mit yidishe shrayber in rusland (With Yiddish writers in Russia) (Buenos Aires, 1959), pp. 9-49; Sh. Slutski, Avrom reyzen biblyografye (Avrom Reyzen’s bibliography) (New York, 1956), no. 5346; Sh. Meltser, in Al naharot (Jerusalem) (1955/1956), pp. 430-31; Y. Fikhman, in Davar (Tel Aviv) (December 26, 1956); M. Poznanski, in Mibifenim (Tel Aviv) (1956/1957); Poznanski, Demuyot melavot (Compulsory figures) (Tel Aviv, 1958), p. 281; Sh. M. Broderzon, in Tog-morgn zhurnal (New York) (January 3, 1958); B. Ts. Goldberg, in Tog-morgn zhurnal (August 2, 1958); L. Ostrovski, in Di goldene keyt (Tel Aviv) 32 (1958); N. Mayzil, Dos yidishe shafn un der yidisher arbeter in sovetn-farband (Jewish creation and the Jewish worker in the Soviet Union) (New York, 1959), see index; Chone Shmeruk, comp., Pirsumim yehudiim babrit-hamoatsot, 1917-1961 (Jewish publications in the Soviet Union, 1917-1961) (Jerusalem, 1961); Y. Lifshits and M. Altshuler, comp., Briv fun yidishe sovetishe shraybers (Letters of Soviet Jewish writers) (Jerusalem, 1979/1980), pp. 172-77.

Aleksander Pomerants 

[Additional information from: Berl Kagan, comp., Leksikon fun yidish-shraybers (Biographical dictionary of Yiddish writers) (New York, 1986), cols. 212-13; 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. 114-18.]