MENASHE KONSTANTINOVSKI

MENASHE KONSTANTINOVSKI (August 13, 1897-October 18, 1958)

            He was born in Lyubar, Volhynia.  He received an excellent Jewish education and graduated from high school as an external student.  He escaped a huge pogrom in his town in 1920 and fled to Galicia.  In 1923 he made his way to Buenos Aires.  There he worked as a teacher and later as a typesetter.  He debuted in print in 1921 with two poems about pogroms in Lemberg’s Togblat (Daily newspaper).  He published poetry, features, and popular science articles and reviews in: Yivo-bleter (Pages from YIVO), Yidish far ale (Yiddish for all), Idishe tsaytung (Jewish newspaper), Di prese (The press), Davke (Necessarily), Penemer un penemlekh (Appearances, big and small), Argentiner tog (Argentinian day), Religyeze shtime (Religious voice), Di idishe velt (The Jewish world), Di pen (The pen), and Argentiner magazin (Argentinian magazine), among others.  In 1924 he edited three months of the illustrated journal Far groys un kleyn (For big and small) in Buenos Aires.  Among other items, he published in it a series of articles entitled “Filozofye un religye” (Philosophy and religion).  His books included: Elementare lektsyes iber deduktiver un induktiver logic (Elementary lectures on deductive and inductive logic), part 1 (Buenos Aires, 1930), 80 pp.; Shpanish-idish verter-bukh (Spanish-Yiddish dictionary [Diccionario Español-Idisch]), published with his edited Idish-shpanish verter-bukh (Yiddish-Spanish dictionary), with Y. L. Vinokur (Winocur) (Buenos Aires, 1931); Dos lid fun der toyer (The song of the gate), music by Y. Shklyar (Buenos Aires: Brider Konstantinovski).  He also contributed to Hebrew-language periodicals.  In 1925 he published Shirim veagadot (Poems and legends), among the first Hebrew books published in Argentina (Buenos Aires, 42 pp.).  He also wrote in Polish and published a volume of poems in Rzeszów.  He was one of the translators of Tanakh into Spanish.  His work appeared in: Antologye fun der yidisher literatur in argentine (Anthology of Jewish literature in Argentina) (Buenos Aires, 1944); Yorbukh fun yidishn yishev in argentine (Yearbook of the Jewish community in Argentina) (Buenos Aires, 1946); and M. Maydanek’s Sefer argentina (Volume for Argentina) (Buenos Aires, 1954).  He died in Buenos Aires.

Sources: Zalmen Reyzen, Leksikon, vol. 3; Getzel Kressel, Leksikon hasifrut haivrit (Handbook of Hebrew literature), vol. 2 (Merḥavya, 1967); Yeshurin archive, YIVO (New York); Antologye fun der yidisher literatur in argentine (Anthology of Jewish literature in Argentina) (Buenos Aires, 1944), pp. 921, 937.

Yoysef Horn