Yiddish Literature and Its Writers

Tsivyon

1908

It has been a long time since things have been this lively in the little Yiddish literary world of Russia. Our young writers have crowned the current period in Jewish life with the name “Cultural Renaissance.” I will not dispute the extent to which this name is correct and pertinent. One can be a skeptic and not believe that the cultural revival of…

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Creator Bio

Tsivyon

1874–1954

Born Ben-Tsiyon Hoffman in a shtetl near Bauska in the Russian Empire (today in Latvia), the writer Tsivyon received a religious education and was ordained as a rabbi in Vilna before obtaining his doctorate in engineering. He started his journalistic career in 1895 with two articles in the Hebrew weekly Ha-Melits and in the following decade published broadly in Hebrew and Yiddish. Moving to the left, he became an editor for The Bundist organ Der veker in 1906. In 1908, Tsivyon immigrated to New York City to become the editor of Ha-Yom, the first American Hebrew newspaper, and the founding editor of Der fraynd, the organ of the Workmen’s Circle. In 1915 he became a member of the Tsukunft editorial board and literary editor of Tog. He actively contributed to the Forverts, Di naye velt, Naye velt-emes, and Frayhayt. Between 1917 and 1939, Tsivyon served on the national executive committee of the Workmen’s Circle and was its general secretary for a short time.

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