KHAYIM (CHAIM) BEYDER

KHAYIM (CHAIM) BEYDER (1920-December 7, 2003)

     He was born in Kupel (Kupil), Khmelnytskyi district, Ukraine.  A younger Soviet writer, his first publications appeared in 1934 in Zay greyt (Be ready!), Yunge gvardye (Young gyuard), and Shern (Star), among others.  He placed early poetry in the anthology Kinder-shafung (Children’s works), edited by L. Kvitko and I. Grinzeid (Kharkov, 1935), 70 pp.  In 1940 he graduated from the Odessa teachers’ institute.  Over the years 1946-1970, he was in Proskurov, Khmelnytskyi and Kamenets-Podolsk, both in Ukraine.  He wrote for Sovetish (Soviet) and other collections, magazines, and newspapers.  In July 1947 a special evening was arranged in his honor in Kiev.  Over the year 1971-1972 he served on the editorial board of Birobidzhaner shtern ( Birobidzhan star) and from 1973 of Sovetish heymland (Soviet homeland).  He was living in Moscow.  He was the author of Khanukas habayis, lider un balades (House-warming, poems and ballads) (Moscow: Sovetski pisatel, 1979), 134 pp.

Source: A. Emkin, “An ovnt fun a yungn dikhter” (An evening for a young writer), Eynikeyt (Moscow) (July 8, 1947); Sovetish heymland, Materyaln far a leksikon fun der yidisher sovetisher literatur (Material for a handbook of Soviet Jewish literature) (September 1975).

[Additional information from: Berl Kagan, comp., Leksikon fun yidish-shraybers (Biographical dictionary of Yiddish writers) (New York, 1986), cols. 80-81.]

[N.B. Beyder went on to lead a fuller life after this entry appeared.  He lived for many years in his native Ukraine, taught for a year in Birobidzhan in the early 1970s and then in Moscow, moved to New York City in 1996, contributed to various Yiddish-language publications in the United States, and died in New York City.]