KHANAYE-MEYER KAYZERMAN (H. M. CAISERMAN)

KHANAYE-MEYER KAYZERMAN (H. M. CAISERMAN) (March 19, 1884-December 24, 1950)

            He was born in Piatra Neamt, Romania.  He graduated from middle school and commercial school in Jassy (Iași).  He made his way to France.  He was a syndicalist and later a Labor Zionist.  In 1910 he arrived in Montreal.  He helped to build the tailors’ unions and to organize the Canadian Jewish Congress, the Jewish immigrant aid association, the Jewish people’s library, and the like.  Over the years 1921-1923, he lived in the land of Israel.  In 1908 he began writing for Romanian serial publications.  From 1910 he contributed reviews of literature, theater, art, music, as well as articles of a journalistic and political-economic character, and translations from English and French literature to the Canadian Yiddish press: Di folkstsaytung (The people’s newspaper), edited by L. Khazanovitsh; Keneder odler (Canadian eagle), for which he was a regular contributor, in Montreal; Idisher zhurnal (Jewish journal) in Toronto; Der bezim (The broom), edited by Y. Malamut, in Winnipeg; Y. Y. Sigal’s Nyuansn (Nuances); Y. Koyfman’s Dos folk (The people); Idisher arbayter (Jewish worker), edited by L. Meltser; Kanader vokhnblat (Canadian weekly newspaper); Nayland (New country); Der kval (The source); and Dos yidishe vort (The Yiddish word) in Winnipeg; among others.  Outside of Canada: Ruvn Brainin’s Der veg (The way); Idisher kemfer (Jewish fighter); and Di tsayt (The times) in New York and London; among others.  In the Canadian Anglo-Jewish press, he published numerous translations from Yiddish literature.  He published poems and epigrams (in Der veg, 1915).  He placed a long series of articles, entitled “Ekonomishe problemen in erets-yirsoel” (Economic problems in the land of Israel), in Keneder odler (1922-1923).  He brought out several pamphlets: Noyt un hilf (Need and help) (Buenos Aires, 1946), 16 pp.; Dos oyfboy-verk fun dzhoynt in erets-yisroel (The reconstruction work of the Joint [Distribution Committee] in the land of Israel) (Buenos Aires, 1948), 20 pp.  His main work was Yidishe dikhter in kanade (Yiddish poets in Canada) (Montreal, 1934), 222 pp.—a book that, in the words of Meylekh Ravitsh, “will be used by the future compiler of an anthology of Canadian poetry for the last fifty years.”  He died in Montreal.

Sources: Zalmen Reyzen, Leksikon, vol. 3; Yisroel Rabinovitsh, Yoyvl-bukh keneder odler (Jubilee volume for Keneder odler) (Montreal, 1927, 1932, 1938); Y. Y. Sigal, in Keneder odler (Montreal) (December 29, 1950); Meylekh Ravitsh, in Keneder odler (January 29, 1951); Yeshurin archive, YIVO (New York); The M. Caiserman Book (Montreal, 1962).

Khayim Leyb Fuks