Avrom Reyzen

Avrom Reyzen

Avrom Reyzen (Abraham Raisen) (1876–1953), Yiddish writer, poet, and editor. He was born in Koidanov (Minsk, eastern Belorussia). Supported by Yaknehoz (pseudonym of Yeshaye Nisn Hakoyen Goldberg), while in his early teens Reyzen sent articles to Dos Yudishes folks-blat in Saint Petersburg, Russia. He corresponded with Jacob Dinezon and Y. L. Peretz; in 1891 they published Reyzen’s poem Ven dos lebn is farbitert (When Life Is Embittered) in their Di yudishe bibliotek (The Yiddish Library). His first story, A kapore der noz abi a goldener zeyger mit 300 rubl nadn (Damn the Nose, As Long As There Is a Dowry of a Watch and 300 Rubles) was published in Vilna in 1892. In 1895, he joined the Russian army, serving in a musicians’ unit until 1899.

In addition to writing for the Zionist Der yud, in 1900 Reyzen created the literary anthology Dos tsvantsikste yorhundert (The Twentieth Century) which included work by Y. L. Peretz, , , and others. A believer in the socialist ideology, Reyzen wrote for the Bund, sometimes under the pseudonym M. Vilner, during the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries.

In 1902, Reyzen published a poetry collection, Tsayt lider (poems of the time), and in 1903 issued a book of stories, Ertseylungen un bilder (Stories and Scenes). He wrote for Der fraynd and Der tog in Saint Petersburg.

A founding father (with Chaim Zhitlovsky, Y.L. Peretz, and his close friends Shalom Asch and H.D. Nomberg) of Yiddishism, he took part in the Czernowitz Yiddish Language Conference of 1908 at which Yiddish was proclaimed a national language of the Jews.

In 1910, he began the Warsaw literary weekly Eyropeyishe literatur (European Literature) and another called Fraye erd (Free Land).

In early 1911, Reyzen moved to New York and contributed to the Forverts and Tsukunft. His Troyerike motivn gevidmet oreme layt (Sad Motifs Dedicated to the Poor was published (at Sholem Aleichem's recommendation) in Philadelphia’s Shtot tsaytung. From 1929 on he worked exclusively for the Forverts, where he wrote a story each week, without a break. In 1935 he completed the three-volume autobiographical Epizodn fun mayn lebn (Episodes From My Life).

Irving Howe wrote about Reyzen:

At his death Reyzen was eulogized:

References

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