VYERA ROZANKA (VERA ROSANKO)

VYERA ROZANKA (VERA ROSANKO) (November 4, 1893-August 27, 1985)

            The wife of the playwright Yisroel Rozenberg, she was born in Konotop, Chernigov Province.  Her true name was Shifre Viner.  She acted with a variety of Yiddish acting troupes.  In 1914 she emigrated to Canada and in 1920 to New York.  With her husband she translated a number of Ukrainian plays.  In 1919 she began to write poetry and stories for: Toronto’s Idisher zhurnal (Jewish journal); Winnipeg’s Unzer vort (Our word); and New York’s Der groyser kundes (The great prankster), Unzer folk (our people), Fraye arbeter shtime (Free voice of labor), Di feder (The pen), and Nyu-yorker vokhnblat (New York weekly newspaper), among others.  In book form: Fun shtot un dorf (From city and village) (New York, 1934), 198 pp.  She died in New York.

Source: Zalmen Zilbertsvayg, Leksikon fun yidishn teater (Handbook of the Yiddish theater), vol. 4 (New York, 1963).

Berl Cohen