LEYVI SHALIT

LEYVI SHALIT (August 2, 1918-1994)

            He was a journalist, born in Samara (Kuibyshev), Russia.  He studied at the Telz and Slabodka yeshivas, later in a German school in Memel.  He went on to study law at Munich University.  He was active Zionist.  He survived the Shavel (Šiauliai) ghetto, where he was among the founders of the underground organization “Masada,” and the Dachau Concentration Camp.  He spent several years with survivors in Germany, and from 1952 he was living in Johannesburg.  He began writing for the Yiddish newspapers in Kovno.  He founded and edited Unzer veg (Our way) in Munich (August 1945), organ of Holocaust survivors in Germany (later edited by Ruvn Rubinshteyn).  He published in various Yiddish newspapers and journals.  He also wrote poetry and stories.  In book form: Meshiekh-troymen in leyviks dramatishe poemes (Messianic dreams in Leivick’s dramatic poems) (Munich: Eynzam, 1947), 62 pp.; Azoy zaynen mir geshorbn (So we died) (Munich, 1949), 332 pp.; A yid in der velt (A Jew in the world) (Johannesburg: Afrikaner yidisher tsaytung, 1972), 275 pp., which also appeared in Hebrew; Tsaytn dertseyln (The times recount), essays (Johannesburg: Afrikaner yidisher tsaytung, 1974), 260 pp., also in Russian (1972) and English (1975).  Among his pen names: Sh. Leyvi, Ben-Elkhonen, Ekhad, and Bar Bar Khone.

Sources: H. Leivick, Mit der sheyres-hapleyte (With the survivors) (New York, 1947); Khayim Liberman, in Forverts (New York) (September 16, 1955); Dovid Volpe, in Afirkaner yidishe tsaytung (Joahnnesburg) (Rosh Hashana, 1972).

Dovid Volpe