MORITS KLEYF
He was a
pharmacist in Novo-Prage (Nova-Praha), a village near Oleksandriya, Kherson
Province. He published Ivan Krylov’s
fourteen fables in Yiddish in Russian [Cyrillic] transcription (Oleksandriya,
1902); this was republished in 1918 in Yiddish lettering under the title Mesholim, nokh krilov (Fables, after
Krylov) (Kharkov: Idish), 28 pp., second edition (Kovno, 1921). “The fables…do indeed excel,” wrote Zalmen
Reyzen, “in their folkish adaptations….
Even more stunning…is the fact that the author is thoroughly estranged
from the Yiddish language and altogether unfamiliar with Yiddish literature.”
Sources: Zalmen Reyzen, Leksikon, vol. 3; Yeshurin archive, YIVO (New York).
Berl Cohen
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