Leyzer Volf

Leyzer Volf
File:Leyzer Volf portrait.jpg
Native name	לייזער וואלף
Born	Eliezer Mekler 1910 (1910) Šnipiškės, Vilnius, Vilnius Governorate, Russian Empire (present-day Lithuania)
Died	1944 (aged 33–34) Shakhrisabz, Uzbek SSR (present-day Uzbekistan)
Occupation	Poet, writer
Language	Yiddish
Nationality	Russian

Leyzer Volf (Yiddish: לייזער וואָלף; Russian: Лейзер Менделевич Вольф, romanized: Leyzer Mendelevich Volf; born Eliezer Mekler; 1910, in Šnipiškės, Vilnius – April 1943, in Shakhrisabz) was a Yiddish poet and writer of the Yung-Vilne movement, best remembered for his poems Black Pearls (1939), Lyric and satire (1940), and Brown Beast (1943).

Biography

Volf's father was a house painter and his mother was a housewife. He was the fourth child in his family. He was sent to cheder at age four, but quickly left after being shocked by the way the rabbi treated the children, after which he was taught privately at home by a melamed. Later on he would study at a secular Jewish folk school in Vilnius and attend a youth camp for weak children; throughout this period he kept a large distance from other children and did not have many friends. Already in school he was considered to be an excellent writer and an avid reader.