Guide to the Collection of Yiddish Literature and Language, 1829-1941, 1955, RG 3

Title: Guide to the Collection of Yiddish Literature and Language, 1829-1941, 1955, RG 3

ID: RG 3 FA

Extent: 29.08 Linear Feet

Arrangement:

These series and subseries are arranged primarily by subject.

This collection was re-assembled in the 1950s, mainly along the lines of a reference collection wherein documents from various individual collections which refer to Yiddish writers had been assembled in folders according to the writer’s name. In re-processing this collection in 2012, the goal has been to enhance description and shed light on the origins of the materials, while preserving the current physical arrangement.

This collection consists of the correspondence of Zalman Reyzin, and correspondence to the Union of Yiddish Writers and Journalists in Vilna. In addition, it contains fragments of literary collections which were part of the YIVO Archives in Vilna before 1941 and of materials which originated in Jewish institutions of higher learning in the Soviet Union, specifically the Institut Far Yidisher Proletarisher Kultur (Institute for Jewish Proletarian Culture) in Kiev and Invayskult in Minsk. The collection was formed in the YIVO Archives in New York ca. 1950. The bulk of the collection comprises files on about 600 Yiddish writers from Eastern Europe consisting of autobiographical notes and letters, biographies, bibliographies, manuscripts and typewritten copies, newspaper clippings, commemorative materials, announcements about lectures.

This collection contains materials gathered in Europe relating to Yiddish literature in Europe and America during the 1920s and 1930s, including manuscripts, correspondence, and autobiographies from approximately 600 individual Yiddish writers. The materials originate from a variety of sources, including Zalman Reisen’s research to revise and extend his Leksikon, the Union of Yiddish Writers and Journalists in Vilna, authors’ personal papers, and Yiddish academic institutions in the Soviet Union. This collection was arranged by YIVO archivists in New York in the 1950s. Most authors contributed only a few materials, usually a letter to Zalman Reisen or the Writer’s Union, and a 1-2 page autobiography in the case of authors writing to Rezyin. Occasionally they would contribute a manuscript of one of their works as well. In the cases of authors’ personal papers, there are more diverse materials, sometimes including personal correspondence, journal entries, additional manuscripts or research notes in addition to professional correspondence and manuscripts. In the materials from the Soviet Union in Series III and IV, there are more articles, institutional records such as minutes and library records, and less personal correspondence. These series are not organized by author, but by subject. Detailed descriptions of the materials in the two primary groups of materials can be found below.

Zalmen Reyzin's Leksikon fun der yidisher literatur, prese, un filologye

Zalman Reisen, editor of the Leksikon fun der yidisher literatur, prese, un filologye , published in Vilna between 1926 and 1929, was the foremost literary biographer of his generation. This key reference work collected biographies and bibliographies of almost all the Yiddish writers of this important period, and served as a predecessor for the current standard in the field, the Leksikon fun der nayer yidisher literatur (Eds. Shmuel Niger, Itsik Shatski, and Moyshe Shtarkman, Alveltlekhn yidishn kultur-kongres, 1956-1981). Almost as important as the sheer amount of information collected in these volumes (which filled four volumes of material collected entirely through Reisen’s own bibliographic research and personal correspondence with authors) was Reisen’s methodology, which strove for accuracy and objectivity in a contentious era marked by unreliable communication and political instability. In the forward to the first volume, Reisen apologizes for being unable to include information from those writers who sent their biographies after the work had gone to the printer, as well as those he never heard from. He calls upon his readers to send him information about the Yiddish writers they know, particularly the lesser-known ones, to contribute corrections or additions to what appears in his Lekiskon. Reisen’s dialogue with his readers created a work that represents the collective knowledge of his generation.

Reisen’s plans for the Leksikon continually evolved throughout the project. Indeed, the Leksikon fun der yidisher literatur, prese, un filologye was itself a continuation of a previous single volume reference work published in 1914. At first, the plan was for the Leksikon to comprise two volumes, the first spanning the first half of the alphabet, and the second to complete it. 1 However, the amount of information gathered quickly required an expansion of the project, which culminated in the four-volume set that was published. In the introduction to the fourth and final published volume, Reisen outlines his plan for a fifth volume, that will contain updated and expanded information on the writers who he was unable to include in the four main volumes, as well as a sixth volume, that would be dedicated to Old Yiddish literature. 2 Scholars (notably the Yiddish scholar Elias Shulman) have surmised that this collection contains the notes for the proposed fifth volume, which was never completed.

Union of Yiddish Writers and Journalists in Vilna

The fareyn fun yidishe literatn un zhurnalistn in vilne – Union of Yiddish Writers and Journalists in Vilna, was a professional association, active in Vilna from 1916 until the outbreak of the second world war. Its membership comprised newspaper editors and writers employed in Yiddish-language publishing enterprises, and other Yiddish authors residing in Vilna. The union was founded in 1916 in wartime Vilna, but remained inactive until the end of the war. The union was revived in 1919 by S. Ansky who wrote by-laws of the new association. Ansky became its honorary chairman, and A. Waiter its secretary. In April 1919 Waiter was killed during a pogrom perpetrated by the Polish military. The leadership of the union was passed on to S. Niger and, after his departure to the U.S., to Zalman Reisen. In the subsequent years the post of the chairman was occupied by Reisen, S.L. Zitron, Moishe Zilburg, Falk Halpern, Dan Kaplanovich, and Moishe Shalit. A.I. Grodzenski served as the union’s secretary for most of the time.

Among its activities, the union arranged for publication of books by its members, established a loan fund ( “kassa”), introduced pensions for retired writers, organized strikes, conducted negotiations with publishers and newspaper owners, and arbitrated disputes between its members. The union maintained contacts with Poland’s Union of Yiddish Writers and Journalists in Warsaw as well as with regional unions. It was also instrumental in establishing a Yiddish Pen Club Center in Vilna and organizing a national conference of the Yiddish press in June of 1927. Finally, it maintained a well-stacked reading room for its membership.

The Union of Yiddish Writers and Journalist in Vilna was dissolved ca. 1940.

Soviet Yiddish Institutions

Invayskult, later known as the Jewish Division of the Belorussian Academy of Sciences, located in Minsk, and the Institute for Proletarian Culture, located at the Ukrainian Academy of Sciences in Kiev, were founded in 1924 and 1929 respectively, and were funded by the government, as part of the Soviet Union’s policy of supporting minority ethnic groups. The Institute for Yiddish Proletarian Culture in Kiev (Rus., Institut Evreiskoi Proletarskoi Kul’tury; IEPK), was directed by Nokhum Shtif, and focused its research on philology. It was shut down in 1936. Both institutions had connections with YIVO. In the early years, Invayskult frequently corresponded with YIVO, and oriented their research toward Eastern European, and especially Lithuanian Jews, who were considered "Lithuanian-Belorussian." Nokhum Shtif, the director of the Institute for Proletarian Culture, was also a co-founder of YIVO.

Footnotes

1 Leksikon vol. 1, Hakdome.

2 Leksikon vol. 4, Hakdome.

References

Zalmen Reyzin. Leksikon fun der yidisher literatur, prese, un filologye. 4 vols. Vilna: Vilna Farlag fun B. Kletzkin, 1927-1929.

Alfred A. Greenbaum. Jewish Historiography in Soviet Russia. Proceedings of the American Academy for Jewish Research, Vol. 28 (1959): 57-76. Article Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/3622447

Vladimir Bilovitsky, "Institute of Jewish Proletarian Culture," YIVO Encyclopedia .

Access Restrictions:

Note to researchers: This collection is currently closed in preparation for the YIVO Vilna Collections Project and will reopen by December 2016

Permission to use the collection must be obtained from the YIVO Archivist at archives@yivo.cjh.org.

Use Restrictions:

Permission to publish part or parts of the collection must be obtained from the YIVO Archives. For more information, contact:

YIVO Institute for Jewish Research, Center for Jewish History, 15 West 16th Street, New York, NY 10011

email: archives@yivo.cjh.org

Acquisition Method: This collection consists of fragments of many literary collections which were part of the YIVO Archives in Vilna before 1941, and of materials which originated in Jewish institutions of higher learning in the Soviet Union, notably in the Institut Far Yidisher Proletarisher Kultur (Institute for Jewish Proletarian Culture) in Kiev. These fragments were among the materials belonging predominantly to theYIVO in Vilna, which were ransacked in 1942-1943 by the Einsatzstab Reichsleiter Rosenberg (ERR), a Nazi unit charged with the looting and disposition of Jewish cultural property in the occupied countries. The YIVO in New York recovered its Vilna archives and library in 1947. Record Group 3 is a segment of a larger block of the Vilna YIVO records within which all folders are numbered consecutively from #1 to the end. Record Group 3 begins at #1701 and continues through #3402.

Separated Materials: The papers of Eliyahu Guttmacher , originally folders 1957-1965, can now be found in RG 27. The papers of Nokhem Shtif , originally folders 3022-3080a of this collection, were removed to constitute an independent record group, RG 57. Finally, the papers of Khaykl Lunski , folders 2311 to 2350a have been physically removed from RG 3 and are now located in Record Group 58.

Preferred Citation: Published citations should take the following form:Identification of item, date (if known); Collection of Yiddish Literature and language; RG 3; box number; folder number; YIVO Institute for Jewish Research.