Nahum Auslander

He was born on 13 December 1893 in Chodorkov, Kiev region, Ukraine, into a family of lumber merchants. At only one year of age he learned in a cheder, and from age six he was taught in Russian by a teacher in his home. From 1906-1911 he learned in a gymnasium in Odessa and Kiev. From 1911-1914 he studied medicine in the Berlin University and after finishing the medical facultat in Kiev, he was mobilized in 1919 into the Russia army as a military doctor. In 1927 he debuted with a song in "Dos fraye vort" (Kiev), then published symbolic songs and literary critiques. A. in the Soviet Union later became one of the most important critics, a researcher and historian of Yiddish literature, language and theatre. He performed with various literature sections, publishing "songs" (Kiev, 1917) "Halber tog" (Smolenski, 1921), "Front" (Kiev, 1921), and "Of lademirer veg" (Charkov-Kiev), "Gruntshtrikhg fun yidish realizm (Kiev, 1923, republished in 1928 in Vilna), "Veg eyn veg oys" (Kiev, 1924), together with boxes and Friedland, "Arbet un kamf," (a literary Khrestomatye), Moscow, 1926), a translation of

Tufmeniev's "Kurtser hantbukh fun politisher ekonomye" (Moscow), and together with L. Goldin,"Leyenbukh farn lednyar" (Kiev, 1933). A. also issued "Der yunger sholem aleichem un zayn roman stempenyu" (Kiev, 1928, and "b. Shafir. Collected work, translated and accompanied by an introduction and remarks by N. Auslander. Publisher Emes," Moscow, 1934). A., together with A. Finkel published "A. Goldfaden, Material For a Biography," (Minsk, 1926, 104 pp.) Dr. Jacob Shatsky, in his critique of the book work about which he shows a series of inaccuracies, and even more writes: "The book has a correct subtitle: Material For a Biography. The Auslander-Finkel book is very far from being a biography of Avraham Goldfaden. It's nothing more than a biographical canvas of Auslander's facts about Goldfaden's life and activities, where it was not connected with the time and environment. In the foreword the author remarked: " ... In our work we have endeavored more or less to systematize the known and to use some unknown materials about Avraham Goldfaden. Mainly we have strived to illuminate the period until the year 1883, that is, until theatre was forbidden in Russia." That's why they are in this first broad biographic canvas of Goldfaden, the "Russian material about the founder of the Yiddish theatre." ... Auslander-Finkel's biography is only superficial. The theatrical and literary as well as the cultural-historical side of Goldfaden's activity is completely untouched. The plays are not theatrically analyzed. ... Like a canvas for a biography, this book is very useful. the construction is very light and clear, the language is good and in general it is felt in the first bibliographic work about Goldfaden a serious tone and an effort as far as possible to use the printed material about this founder of the Yiddish theatre. However, the chapters on Russia must be especially emphasized, which are of great value thanks to the fact that the Russian press, really the "true Russia," which is absolutely not accessible to a researcher who works outside of Russia. ... About certain material that Y. Riminik has published (in Kiev's "Theatre Book", 1926), it is to be seen that the material from the Russian press is in Auslander-Finkel's book is not fully utilized, and that there is still a lot to be done in this area. In addition to the new materials that are available in this book, the authors should be grateful." In 1940 in Moscow (pp. 217), A.'s book, "Yiddish Theatre" 1887-1917 was published. Zalmen Zylbercweig writes: "This book no doubt is very important, and the author deserves a great credit for is odd work, mainly thanks to the many citations that he brought from the press, especially the Russian, of theatre reviews and critiques, in order to confirm his Marxist approach to the Yiddish theatre problem. Besides, the collected material was not used by anyone, in all likelihood, that the Nazi-Soviet state edited many of the materials that would therefore have been completely lost to the history and evaluations regarding the progress of the Yiddish theatre in those years. But at the same time with praise that the author of book deserved, and it should be given to him, one should not close the eyes, that his work is far from complete and in any case the image he brings about the nevi of the Yiddish theatre, his struggle for existence, and who the fighter was, not exactly, andit  is perhaps the result of this, that the author avoided most of the materials that did not serve his theory about the negative relationship of the "bourgeois" part of the Jewish population, which was very much "in love" with the shund, and that only thanks to the broad Jewish masses, the flag of better Jewish theatre was kept alive. But even about better Yiddish theatre that Auslander dedicates the overwhelming majority of his book to the great actress Esther Rachel Kaminska, he does not mention at all the attempts that were made with literary plays in the stable Yiddish theatres of Zandberg, Julius Adler and Herman Serotsky in Lodz, "the Vilna Troupe" in Vilna, and the epoch of the European operetta in Warsaw and Lodz. Auslander is so busy "confirming" his theories that he doesn't entirely mention the tens of Yiddish troupes that are driving around across the Czarist Imperia, and who their directors were: Julius Adler, Herman Serotsky, Bernstein, Becker, Genfer, Guzik, Zhitomirski, Zandberg, Miishurat, Kompaneyets, Korik, Rappel, Shliferstein, whose Yiddish productions were the majority of the building and construction of Yiddish theatre in the Czarist imperia. He also dismisses the direction of Sabsey with numbered [a few] lines. He put a little more into the direction of Sam Adler and Spivakovsky, who also had, actually, played the same repertoire as the unmentioned directors, with a small addition of "better plays." This image of Yiddish theatre in the span of the thirties, which he treats in his book. Therefore, it is not true, but this does not diminish the value of the information and facts that he brings out here. Only by confronting another history book will the reader himself be able to decide how far-fetched or false A.'s theories and conclusions are. He comes to in his interesting, sometimes exciting, but non-objective book." A. survived the terrible Stalin-period, and since the publication of "Soviet Homeland," was an editorial member and there published much new research about Yiddish litature. He completed an unpublished book, "Di antshteyung fun der yidisher sovetisher dikhtung," of which he had a chapter published in "Soviet Homeland" (N.' 1, 1962). On September 28, 1962, A. passed away in Moscow. Sh.E. by Zalmen Zylbercweig. "Lexicon of the New Yiddish Literature," New York, 1956, pp. 30-31. Kh. Shmruk -- "Prsumim yhudeym bbrit hmuetsut," Jerusalem, 1961.