BOREKH ZONENBERG

BOREKH ZONENBERG (1910-1943)

            He was born in Aleksander, near Lodz, Poland, into an observant, laboring family.  He studied in religious elementary school.  In his youth he became a stocking maker.  He was active in the Bundist youth organization “Tsukunft” (Future).  He debuted in print with poetry of lyrical and social content in Yugnt-veker (Youth alarm) in Warsaw (1929), later publishing in Folkstsaytung (People’s newspaper) in Warsaw and Lodzher veker (Lodz alarm) in Lodz, and elsewhere, where, aside from poems, he also placed scenes from Jewish laboring lives.  He was the Aleksander correspondent for the aforementioned publications under his party name of “Boris.”  He contributed as well to the poetry anthology Af der shvel (At the threshold) (Warsaw, 1931).  When the Germans seized Poland in 1939, he escaped to the Russian-occupied area, and from there in June 1940 he was sent to Soviet camps.  In August 1941 he was freed under the amnesty for Polish citizens, and until 1943 he lived in a distant corner of southern Kazakhstan.  He died of hunger and exhaustion in a collective farm in southern Kazakhstan.

Sources: Y. P[at], in Vokhnshrift far literatur (Warsaw) (July 17, 1931); P. Shvarts, in Fun noentn over (New York) 2 (1956); M. Bernshteyn, in Unzer tsayt (New York) (November-December 1957); Kh. L. Fuks, in Fun noentn over 3 (1957), pp. 246, 257.