MORTKHE HERBST

MORTKHE HERBST (b. December 25, 1930)

            He was born in Horodle (Horodło), Lublin region, Poland.  At the age of five, he moved with his parents to Argentina.  He studied in religious primary school, in a Yiddish-Hebrew school, and later in a Hebrew-Yiddish teachers’ seminary in Buenos Aires.  He completed two years at “Midrasha ivrit” (Hebrew college) in Santa Fe.  He was active in the Zionist movement.  He founded and was president of the Hebrew youth movement “Tenuat hanoar haivri beargentina” (Organization of Jewish youth in Argentina).  He debuted in print in 1951 in Di yidishe tsaytung (The Jewish newspaper) and thereafter published essays, stories, and treatises in: Di yidish tsaytung, Mizrakhi-shtime (Voice of Mizrachi), Religyeze shtime (Religious voice), and Yung argentine (Young Argentina).  In book form: Tsientishishe figurn (Zionist figures) (Buenos Aires, 1953), 196 pp., which won the Mortkhe Strigler Prize in 1953; Tsaytmotivn (Contemporary motifs), stories, essays, and articles (Buenos Aires, 1957), 199 pp.; Batrakhtungen fun der noent (Considerations of what is near at hand) (Buenos Aires, 1961), 167 pp.; Af eygene vegn (On one’s own paths) ( Buenos Aires, 1966), 226 pp.; In gayst fun doyres (In the spirit of generations) (Buenos Aires, 1968), 203 pp.; In oysgebenktn land (In a long-for land) (Jerusalem, 1976), 264 pp.  He was last living in Lanús in the province of Buenos Aires.

Sources: Sh. Rozhanski, in Yidishe tsaytung (Buenos Aires) (July 9, 1953); Yunger dor (Young generation) (Buenos Aires, 1953), p. 23; M. Bursuk, in Kolonist-kooperator (Buenos Aires) (March 1955).

[Additional information from: Berl Kagan, comp., Leksikon fun yidish-shraybers (Biographical dictionary of Yiddish writers) (New York, 1986), col. 223.]