SHMUEL MARVIL

SHMUEL MARVIL (1906-1943)

            He was born in a town near Warsaw.  He attended religious elementary school, synagogue study hall, and yeshiva.  He was employed in a Warsaw office, and later he engaged in business.  He debuted in print in A. M. Vaysenberg’s (Weissenberg’s) journal Inzer hofening (Our hope) in 1927 with a biographical sketch in four acts: Di libe (The love), published serially.  He contributed reportage pieces and sketches to Ekspres (Express) in Warsaw and to a variety of newspapers in the provinces.  In book form: Di makhsheyfe (The sorceress), a dramatic poem (Warsaw, 1930), 16 pp.; Der vanderer, dramatishe poeme in dray bilder (The wanderer, a dramatic poem in three scenes) (Warsaw, 1935), 40 pp.; Trern in der nakht, lider un poeme (Tears in the night, poetry) (Warsaw, 1937), 63 pp.; Ver arop un ver aroyf (Who’s down and who’s up) (Warsaw, 1934), 47 pp.; Shoyel hameylekh (King Saul) (Warsaw, 1935), 47 pp.  He was confined in the Warsaw Ghetto.  His poem “Tsu di hern” (To the sirs), written during the years of the Holocaust, was a cry of protest to the world which was remaining silent before the annihilation of the Jewish people.  A second poem of his, “Di gas” (The street), describes the tragic condition of the Jews in the Warsaw Ghetto.  He was murdered by the Nazis.

Sources: Y. Bershteyn, “Trern in der nakht” (Tears in the night), Heftn (Notebooks) (Warsaw) (April 5, 1939); B. Mark, Umgekumene shrayber fun di getos un lagern (Murdered writers from the ghettos and camps) (Warsaw, 1954), pp. 68, 109, 122, 128, 129.

Benyomen Elis