I. L. Peretz - י.ל. פרץ

Isaac Leib Peretz (May 18, 1852 – 3 April 1915), also known as Yitskhok Leybush Peretz (יצחק־לייבוש פרץ) and Icchok Lejbusz Perec or Izaak Lejb Perec (in Polish), best known as I.L. Peretz, was a Yiddish language author and playwright. Payson R. Stevens, Charles M. Levine, and Sol Steinmetz count him with Mendele Mokher Seforim and Sholem Aleichem as one of the three great classical Yiddish writers. Sol Liptzin wrote: "Yitzkhok Leibush Peretz was the great awakener of Yiddish-speaking Jewry, and Sholom Aleichem its comforter... Peretz aroused in his readers the will for self-emancipation, the will for resistance..."

Peretz rejected cultural universalism, seeing the world as composed of different nations, each with its own character. Liptzin comments that "Every people is seen by him as a chosen people..."; he saw his role as a Jewish writer to express "Jewish ideals...grounded in Jewish tradition and Jewish history."

Unlike many other Maskilim, he greatly respected the Hasidic Jews for their mode of being in the world; at the same time, he understood that there was a need to make allowances for human frailty. His short stories such as "If Not Higher", "The Treasure", and "Beside the Dying" emphasize the importance of sincere piety rather than empty religiosity.

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יוסף לייבוש (י"ל) פרץ

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Writer, poet, dramaturgist, journalist, essayist and literay theoretician Iccak Lejb Perec (Yitzhak Leib Peretz) (1852-1915) was born in Congress Poland Zamość, then a part of the Russian Empire. He worked there as an attorney, but due to informing on his political stands for free liberal Poland, his lisence was deprived. He moved to ulica Ceglana, Warsaw in 1886 and began a job as a bureaucrat in the Jewish Community, where he remained until the end of his life

He started writing Hebrew, then turned to Polish and Yiddish. In 1888 he published the Yiddish poem titled "Monish," sparking off a Romantic trend in Yiddish poetry. Most his work is an expression of his deep love to Amcha Israel, the simple people. Being close to socialist streams both the anti Zionist Bund, as well as the Zionist Poaley Tzion, he was attacked by the conservative religious orthodox parties (e.g. Agudat Israel), as well as by burgeois groups

His home in Cegalna Warsaw became a focal point for Jewish cultural life, and a center of the literary Jewish republic. In 1899-1900 he wrote most of his Folktales and Chassidic Motifs. He was treated as one side of the triangle with Mendale Mocher Sefarim and Shulem Aleichem

During the 1905 Revolution he cooperated with the press of the parties political parties Bund and the Jewish wing of the Polish Socialist Party

Despite of his bad economical situation, he donated money to poor people and assisted war refugees

In 1908 Peretz headed the Czernowitz (Bukovina) Convention of Yiddish, dealing with the future status of the language and its role in literature, journalism, poetry and drama

The last and greatest drama of Peretz, the great expressionist play “Night in the Old Market place”, was written in 1907

Peretz died on Pessach, April, 1915, in the midst of World War I. Over one hundred thousand people attended his funeral

https://billiongraves.com/grave/%D7%99%D7%A6%D7%97%D7%A7-%D7%9C%D7%...

י"ל פרץ (18 במאי 1851, זמושץ' – 3 באפריל 1915, ורשה) הוא שם העט וקיצור שמו המלא של יצחק לייבוש פרץ מחשובי הסופרים ביידיש ובעברית בתקופת ההשכלה

י"ל פרץ תיאר באהבה ובאהדה רבה את חיי הקהילה היהודית במזרח אירופה, הזדהה עם סבלות פשוטי העם, ואף כתב באור חיובי ואוהד על תנועת החסידות, שהייתה בתקופה זו יעד להתקפות עזות הן מצד המשכילים היהודיים והן מצד נאמני הדת במתכונתה המסורתית הישנה ("הליטאים"). י

מרבית יצירותיו של פרץ הם סיפורים קצרים, אך הוא כתב גם שירה, סיפורים ארוכים יותר כמו "חורבן בית הצדיק" (במקור: "שלשלת הזהב"), תרגומים - בעיקר של יצירותיו שלו עצמו מיידיש לעברית, וכן עסק בהוראה ובעידוד סופרים עבריים צעירים

ספרי י"ל פרץ בעברית

   הכנסת כלה, מקובלים, וילנה, 1922.

   האלמנה והרוח, עיבוד לעברית קלה, ירושלים, 1990.

   האילמת; מנגינת הזמן, בן אביגדור, ורשה, 1913.

   בשעת מגפה, ניו יורק, 1909.

   הכנסת כלה, ניו יורק, 1920.

   חסידות, דביר, 1971.

   טוב, דביר, 1929.

   י"ל פרץ לבני הנעורים, דביר, 1929.

   ילקוט פרץ, מעובד לעברית קלה, ירושלים, 1975.

   כל כתבי י. ל. פרץ, העבריים והמתורגמים מיידיש, דביר, 1975.

   מפי העם (הערות וביאורים: יהודה פרידלנדר; איורים: יוסל ברגנר), דביר, 1971.

   נעילה, ניו יורק, 1920.

   העגב, שירי אהבה, ורשה, 1890.

   פוחת והולך, דביר, 1929