MOTL KIPER

MOTL KIPER (1896-1938)

            He was a journalist and community leader, born in Chernihiv, Zhytomyr Province, into the family of a blacksmith. He studied in religious elementary school and went on to work as a tailor, initially in his hometown and later in Kiev, Saratov, and Zhytomyr. From 1912 he was active in the Bund, and shortly after the Russian Revolution, he joined the Communist Party and was appointed chairman of the Volhynian provincial committee. In 1920 he was secretary of the main office of the Byelorussian Jewish section, in 1921 the People’s Commissar for Nationality Matters in Byelorussia, from December 1924 secretary of the Jewish section of the Central Committee of the Communist Party in Ukraine, and a host of other important positions in the Party-state apparatus. He was sufficiently popular that in the Jewish district of Kalinindorf, that there was a settlement known by his name—Kiperovke. In 1936 he was appointed deputy chairman in the agitprop division of Dnepropetrovsk regional party committee. This all changed later when he was arrested. In August 1936 articles began to appear which accused Kiper of Trotskyism and nationalism. At the time, this was the direct route to being purged, and that is precisely what happened: according to available information, his life was cut short in 1938, as he was thought to have died in the Gulag.

He began his journalistic work in the Bundist Folkstsaytung (People’s newspaper) in Kiev (1917). He wrote articles and research works on literary and mainly Party-political and socio-economic themes in: Minsk’s Profesyonele bavegung (Trade union movement), also its co-editor, and Der veker (The alarm) in 1921; Moscow’s Der emes (The truth); and Kharkov’s Shtern (Star), Der poyer (The farmer), Der kustar (The handicraftsman), Yunge gvardye (Young guard), Ratnbildung (Soviet education), and Prolit (Proletarian literature), among others. He served as editor for: Der shtern (The star) in Minsk (from October 1920); Di komunistishe fon (The Communist banner) and Di komunistishe shtim (The Communist voice), both in Zhytomyr (1919, one issue each); and Der komunistisher veg (The Communist way) (Homyel', 1922-1924). For a number of years (1924-1933) he co-edited the central Yiddish journal in Ukraine, Di royte velt (The red world), in which he published longer essays on such topics as: the task of Bolshevizing and Sovietizing Jewish labor, the nationality question in Ukraine, problems of settling Jews on the land, the issue of the present state and future fate of the shtetl, and Birobidzhan.

His writings include: 10 yor oktyaber-revolutsye (Ten years of the October Revolution) (Kiev: Kultur-lige, 1927), 142 pp.; Di valn in di ratn un di yidishe arbetndike (The elections in the councils and the Jewish workers) (Kharkov: Central Publishers, 1928), 48 pp.; Der itstiker tsienizm un zayn yeride (Contemporary Zionism and its demise) (Kharkov: Central Publishers, 1929), 72 pp.; Antisemitizm un yidisher natsyonalizm (Anti-Semitism and Jewish nationalism) (Kiev: Kultur-lige, 1929), 72 pp.; Sakhaklen fun di valn in di ratn un di arbet in shtetl (Summing up of the elections in the councils and the work in the town) (Kiev: Kultur-lige, 1929), 69 pp.; 5 yor komerd (Five years of the Committee for Land Settlement of Jewish Laborers) (Kharkov: Central Publishers, 1929), 23 pp.; In fanandergevikltn sotsyalistishn ongrif (Socialist attack unbound) (Kharkov: Central Publishers, 1930), 48 pp.; Af di leninishe pozitsyes (On Leninist positions) (Kharkov: Central Publishers, 1930), 116 pp.; Der antireligyezer kultur-marsh un di kultboyung in der yidishe svive (The anti-religious cultural march and cultural construction in the Jewish environment) (Kharkov: Central Publishers, 1930), 48 pp.; Di politik fun der kp(b)u in der natsyonaler frage (The politics of the Communist Party [Bolsheviks] of Ukraine and the nationality question) (Kharkov: Literatur un kunst, 1931), 326 pp.; Sotsyal-ekonomishe iberboy (Socio-economic reconstruction) (Kharkov-Kiev: Ukrainian State Publishers for National Minorities, 1932), 128 pp.; 15 yor kamf farn sotsyalizm (Fifteen years of struggle for socialism) (Kharkov-Kiev: Ukrainian State Publishers for National Minorities, 1932), 128 pp. Kiper’s principal work was Dos yidishe shtetl in ukraine (The Jewish shtetl in Ukraine) (Kharkov: Ukrainian State Publishers, 1929), 223 pp. The socio-economic and cultural face of prewar the Jewish-Ukrainian shtetl was painted here from a narrow materialistic point of view.

Sources: Zalmen Reyzen, Leksikon, vol. 3; Chone Shmeruk, comp., Pirsumim yehudiim babrit-hamoatsot, 1917-1961 (Jewish publications in the Soviet Union, 1917-1961) (Jerusalem, 1961), see index; Yeshurin archive, YIVO (New York); Z. Gitelman, Jewish Nationality and Soviet Politics (Princeton, 1972), see index.

Dr. Avrom Grinboym

[Additional information from: Chaim Beider, Leksikon fun yidishe shrayber in ratn-farband (Biographical dictionary of Yiddish writers in the Soviet Union), ed. Boris Sandler and Gennady Estraikh (New York: Congress for Jewish Culture, Inc., 2011), pp. 337-38.]