VOLF
VEVYORKE (1896-January 18, 1945)
The younger brother of Avrom
Vevyorke, he was born in Zhirardov (Żyrardów), Poland.
He studied in religious primary schools and synagogue study hall, and
secular subjects with private tutors and self-study. After WWI he moved to Germany, lived for a
time in Berlin, and became acquainted with immigrant Jewish writers who had lived
there since the Russian Revolution. In
1924 he moved on to Paris, ran an inexpensive restaurant for students in the
Latin Quarter, a place which later became a meeting point for Jewish writers
and men of literature. Using the pen
name Ish Khosid (Hassidic man), he debuted in print around 1920 with a
story. In 1925 he published and edited Nest (Nest), “a magazine for the
artistic use of words,” in Paris (one issue appeared, 16 pp.). He published stories, Hassidic tales, and
articles in: Parizer bleter (Parisian
leaves), a weekly and later a daily (published between September 1924 and
October 1926); Folkstsaytung
(People’s newspaper) in Warsaw; Forverts
(Forward) in New York; and Di prese
(The press) in Buenos Aires. He served
for a time as Parisian correspondent for the last two of these, also sometimes
using the pen name Y. Feldman. In 1932
he was a regular contributor to the Parisian daily Der tog (The day), edited by Noyekh Prilucki. Together with Sh. L. Shnayderman and Shloyme
Rozenberg, 1933-1934, he edited Parizer
vokhnblat (Parisian weekly newspaper).
In 1937 he became a regular contributor to the daily Parizer haynt (Paris today), at which he
later served as literary editor. He held
this position until the final issue (June 10, 1940), when the Germans reached
Paris. His books include: Mizrekh un mayrev (East and west),
collected writings, vol. 1 (Paris, 1936), 190 pp.; Bodnloze mentshn (People without land), collected writings, vol. 2
(Paris, 1937), 190 pp. In these two
volumes, he included his stories of Parisian Jewish life between the two world
wars, in which he depicts the “nice young people” come from Warsaw, the boors
working their way up, youngsters with revolutionary ideas who went to Spain to
sacrifice their young lives for the goal of fighting fascism, types of
intellectuals and artists from Montmartre and Montparnasse, the squares and
Belleville in Paris.
In June 1940, as the Nazis
approached Paris, Vevyorke, just like others, left on foot in the direction of the
south of France, lived for a short while in Montauban, near Toulouse, then left
there for Nice, and made strenuous efforts to escape to the United States, but
was unsuccessful in this. During the
Italian occupation of Nice, he and the writers Khil Aronson, Zaynvl Diamant, Y.
Kh. Klinger, and Simkhe Shvarts contributed in the cultural realm with the
local relief committee for Jewish refugees, and Vevyorke in particular
befriended and assisted his writer colleagues who reached that far. In 1943, after the Germans took possession of
the southern zone from France, he was taken from his place of hiding and
deported to Germany. According to
testimony given by the young poet from Lodz, Avrom-Pinkhes Tsikert, in 1944 Vevyorke
was in Auschwitz and worked in “Canada,” as the internees called the area where
all new arrivals were told to leave their belongings.[1] According to another piece of testimony, he
was murdered in Birkenau on January 18, 1945.
His wife, two daughters, and sons-in-law were also deported to their
deaths. A collection of some of his
published articles may be found at YIVO.
Sources:
Zalmen Reyzen, Leksikon, vol. 1, col.
989 (under the entry for Avrom Vevyorke); Biblyografishe
yorbikher fun yivo (Bibliographic yearbooks from YIVO), vol. 1 (Warsaw,
1928), pp. 7273-76, 8509-13; B. Shlevin, in Literarishe
bleter (Warsaw) (September 4, 1936); Shlevin, in notices in Literarishe bleter (April 3 and
September 18, 1936); Z. Shaykovski, Yidn
in frankraykh (Jews in France), vol. 1 (New York: YIVO, 1942), pp. 263-64;
D. Tsharni (Charney), in Tsukunft
(New York) (January 1943); A. Vayts, in Yizker
bukh, tsum ondenk fun 14 umgekumene parizer yidishe shrayber (Remembrance
book, to the memory of fourteen murdered Parisian Jewish writers) (Paris,
1946), pp. 120-23; M. Shulshteyn, in Yizker
bukh, tsum ondenk fun 14 umgekumene parizer yidishe shrayber, p. 21; A. P.
Tsikert, in Loshn un lebn (London)
(April 1946); Idisher kemfer (New
York) (August 29, 1947); Z. Diamant, in Haiton
hademokrati (Tel Aviv) (October 26, 1946); Diamant, in Fun noentn over (New York) 4 (1959); H. Fentser, in Unzer shtime (Paris), jubilee issue
(November 20, 1955) and subsequent issues; Y. Papyernikov, Heymishe un noente (Familiar and close) (Tel Aviv, 1958), pp.
233-34.
Zaynvl Diamant
[1] Canada was seen as a land of abundance, and this
section of Auschwitz-Birkenau was a storage site for the belongings. (JAF)
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