YUDL YOFE

YUDL YOFE (1882-July 1941)

            He was prose writer, born in Borzna, Chernihiv district, Ukraine. He was orphaned at an early age and was raised by a sister in the nearby town of Nyezhin (Nizhyn); early on he worked as an apprentice to a tailor. He independently learned to read and write Yiddish at age thirteen. He joined the labor movement in his youth and traveled around as a revolutionary agitator through the Jewish towns in Ukraine and Bessarabia. Around 1903 he published an image of the struggle in an illegal publication in Kishinev. Following the Revolution of 1905, he joined the anarchist movement and carried out a series of daring missions for the anarchists. In the years before and during WWI, he lived in Smorgon (Smarhon) and Vilna. His literary activities began with a piece (under the pen name “Folksbund”) in Lebn un visnshaft (Life and science) in Vilna (1910). In 1915 he published in Di yidishe velt (The Jewish world) in Vilna a longer story entitled “Dos eydeml” (The son-in-law). He also wrote poetry and sketches for a variety of Yiddish publications, such as Di vokh (The week) (1914-1915). He contributed as well to the trade union organ in Vilna, Der shnayder (The tailor). In 1921 he departed for Moscow and from that point published longer and shorter stories as a proletarian writer in Soviet Yiddish newspapers and magazines in Moscow, Kiev, Kharkov, and Minsk, such as: Emes (Truth), Shtern (Star), Oktyabr (October), Sovetish (Soviet), Royte velt (Red world), Proletarishe fon (Proletarian banner), and Yunge gvardye (Young guard), among others, as well as in Frayhayt (Freedom) in New York. He was also known as a gifted sculptor. He died in Moscow.

In book form: Fun amol (From the past), a story (Moscow: Emes, 1928), 12 pp.; In kesl-grub, dertseylungen (In a whirlpool, stories) (Moscow: Emes, 1929), 154 pp.; In groysn nep-hoyz (In a large NEP [New economic policy] house), stories (Kiev: Kultur-lige, 1929), 235 pp.; A dire, dertseylungen (An apartment, stories) (Moscow: Central Publishers, 1929), 143 pp.; In kamf, dertseylungen (In the struggle, stories) (Moscow: Emes, 1932), 154 pp.; Fun trep tsu trep (From step to step), stories (Moscow: Emes, 1933), 186 pp.; Onvuks (A growth), a novel in four parts (Moscow, 1934), 192 pp.; Dertseylungen (Stories) (Minsk: Byelorussian State Publishers, 1935), 89 pp.; Dos eydeml, a novel (Moscow: Emes, 1936), 384 pp.; Ale veltn, dertseylungen (All worlds, stories) (Moscow: Emes, 1938), 163 pp.; Artshik bruk, dertseylung far kinder (Artshik path, a story for children) (Moscow: Emes, 1939), 38 pp.; Frishe koykhes, roman (Fresh strengths, a novel) (Moscow: Emes, 1940), 198 pp.; Gingold (Fine gold), stories (Moscow: Emes, 1940), 27 pp.; Afn glaykhn veg, dertseylungen (On the same road, stories) (Moscow, 1941), 135 pp. His work appeared as well in: Far der bine: dertseylungen, pyeses, lider (For the stage: stories, plays, poems), with musical notation (together with Yekhezkl Dobrushin and Elye Gordon) (Moscow: Central People’s Publisher, 1929); Der arbeter in der yidisher literatur, fargesene lider (The worker in Yiddish literature, forgotten poems) (Moscow, 1939); and Der veg fun farat, kamf kegn bundizm un menshevizm in der yidisher proletarisher literatur (The way of betrayal, the struggle against Bundism and Menshevism in Jewish proletarian literature) (Moscow: Central People’s Publisher, 1932).

Sources: Zalmen Reyzen, Leksikon, vol. 1; Shmuel Niger, in Literarishe bleter (Warsaw) (April 29, 1927); B. Orshanski, in Di royte velt (Kharkov) (March 1930); Y. Bronshteyn, in Literaturnaia entsiklopediya (Literary encyclopedia) (Moscow, 1930), pp. 558-59; M. Mizhiritski, in Di royte velt (October 1931); B. Vaysman, in Proletarishe fon (Kiev) 59 (1934); D. Tsharni (Daniel Charney), in Tsukunft (New York) (October 1935); A. Y. G., in Yunge gvardye (Kharkov) 7 (1935); N. Rubinshteyn, Dos yidishe bukh in sovetn-farband 1932-1934 (The Yiddish book in the Soviet Union, 1932-1934) (Minsk, 1935), see index; Y. Dobrushin, in Eynikeyt (Moscow) (July 5, 1942); N. Y. Gotlib, in Sovetishe literatur (Montreal) (1945), pp. 57-58.

Borekh Tshubinski

[Additional information from: Berl Kagan, comp., Leksikon fun yidish-shraybers (Biographical dictionary of Yiddish writers) (New York, 1986), cols. 305-6; Chaim Beider, Leksikon fun yidishe shrayber in ratn-farband (Biographical dictionary of Yiddish writers in the Soviet Union), ed. Boris Sandler and Gennady Estraikh (New York: Congress for Jewish Culture, Inc., 2011), p. 175.]