A. LURYA

A. LURYA (b. ca. 1914)

            The pen name of Yankev Birnboym, in 1951 he came to the United States from a camp of Holocaust survivors in Germany.  For many years he contributed to the Jewish Culture Congress.  He was literary editor of Yiddish-language Dertsiung-entsiklopedye (Encyclopedia of education) (New York) (1957, 1959); Pinkes far der forshung fun der yidisher literatur un prese (Records of research on Yiddish literature and the press) (New York, 1971), in which he published a long work on the journal In zikh (Introspective); and Di yidishe drame in tsvantsikstn yorhundert (Yiddish drama in the twentieth century) (New York, 1977).  He contributed to the Groyser verterbukh fun der yidisher shprakh (Great dictionary of the Yiddish language) (New York, 1961, 1965); and he was a co-editor of volume seven of Leksikon fun der nayer yidisher literatur (Biographical dictionary of modern Yiddish literature).  He contributed poems, stories, and articles to: Idisher kemfer (Jewish fighter), Yidishe kultur (Jewish culture), Yidishe shprakh (Yiddish language), Fraye arbeter-shtime (Free voice of labor), Unzer tsayt (Our time), Kinder-zhurnal (Children’s magazine), and Zayn (To be) in New York; Goldene keyt (Golden chain), Bay zikh (On one’s own), Folk un velt (People and world), and Lebns-fragn (Life issues) in Tel Aviv; Yerusholaimer almanakh (Jerusalem almanac); Unzer vort (Our word) in Paris; Idishe prese (Jewish press) in Buenos Aires; Kheshbn (The score) in Los Angeles.  In book form, he translated into Yiddish: Shimen Dubnov’s Dos bukh fun mayn lebn (The book of my life [original: Kniga zhizni]) (Buenos Aires, 1962, 1963).  His own volume of poetry was set in type in 1951 in Munich, but was never published.  He was last living in New York.

Source: Sh. Shtern, in Morgn-faryhayt (New York) (January 28, 1979).

Berl Kagan, comp., Leksikon fun yidish-shraybers (Biographical dictionary of Yiddish writers) (New York, 1986), cols. 544-45.