MOYSHE ETINGER (ETTINGER)

MOYSHE ETINGER (ETTINGER) (b. April 26, 1908)

            He was born in Kalush (Kalish), Stanislav district, eastern Galicia.  He studied in religious elementary school, public school, and a Tarbut school, while later he attended a Hebrew teachers’ seminary in Lemberg.  He was active in Hashomer Hatsayir (The young guard) and in Hitaḥdut (the “union” of young Zionists [Tseire-tsiyon]), and he founded the first Yiddish courses for laborers in his hometown.  He also managed the Yiddish book division of the Tushiya library.  In 1938 he arrived in the United States.  In 1946 he debuted in print with poems in Literarishe heftn (Literary notebooks) in New York, later placing his poems in: Yidishe shriftn (Yiddish writings), Der amerikaner (The American), Nyu yorker vokhenblat (New York weekly newspaper), Idisher kemfer (Jewish fighter), Di tsukunft (The future), Unzer tsayt (Our time—September 1964), Zayn (Being), and Undzer veg (Our way) in New York; Der holts-industryal (The wood industry) in Buenos Aires; and elsewhere.  In book form: Feygl bay mayn fentster, lider (Bird at my widow, poetry) (New York: Zayn, 1961), 94 pp.; In bund fun lebn, lider (Covenant with life, poems) (New York: Brider Shulzinger, 1969), 94 pp.; Derhoybene teg, lider (Exalted days, poems) (Jerusalem, 1979), 82 pp.  He was last living in New York.

Sources: Yankev Glatshteyn, in Idisher kemfer (New York) (August 1962); Shloyme Bikl, in Tog-morgn-zhurnal (New York) (June 2, 1963).

Benyome Elis

[Additional information from: Berl Kagan, comp., Leksikon fun yidish-shraybers (Biographical dictionary of Yiddish writers) (New York, 1986), col. 414.]