YOYSEF LIVSHIN

YOYSEF LIVSHIN (1879-April 20, 1937)

            He was born in Disna, Vilna district, Lithuania.  He was a teacher in a Hebrew senior high school in Kovno.  He published articles on pedagogy, legends concerning Lithuania, and treatments of popular Jewish creation in: Di idishe shtime (The Jewish voice) in Kovno; and Frimorgn (Morning) in Riga; among others.  He was the author of Hebrew and Yiddish textbooks which were used in the Hebrew and Yiddish schools in Lithuania, among them: Der kleyner bal kheshbn (The little arithmetician) (Kovno, 1926), 48 pp.; Geografya shel lita (Geography of Lithuania) (Kovno, 1926), 98 pp., second edition (1927); Korot halitaim (History of the Lithuanians) (Kovno, 1928), 96 pp.  He also translated Lithuanian legends into Yiddish.  His other translations include: Michael Faraday, Di geshikhte fun a likht (The history of a light), with a biography of Faraday (Vilna, 1923), 105 pp.  He wrote novels about Jewish life.  He published about the expulsion from Vilkomir in Vilner zamlung (Vilna anthology), vol. 2 (Vilna, 1918).  He also wrote the plays Di mageyfe (The plague) and Aleksoto stebuklas (The Aleksoto miracle).  He literary pseudonyms include: Ben-Lipman and Y. A. Lepshin.  He died in Kovno.

Sources: Biblyografishe yorbikher fun yivo (Bibliographic yearbooks from YIVO) (Warsaw, 1928), see index; Information from Yudel Mark in New York.

Khayim Leyb Fuks

[Additional information from: Berl Kagan, comp., Leksikon fun yidish-shraybers (Biographical dictionary of Yiddish writers) (New York, 1986), col. 331.]