Bialik, Chaim Nachman (1873-1934)

Jewish poet, writer, and translator, born in Ukraine. He established his literary reputation with the publication of Ha-Matmid/The Talmudic Student. Bialik came to be acknowledged as the greatest modern Hebrew poet, but was also an essayist, short-story writer, and editor. His promotion of the Hebrew language and his powerful indictments of inhumanity led to his being acclaimed during his lifetime as one of the ‘Sages of Odessa’ and the unofficial voice of the Jews of Eastern Europe.

Bialik's poetry expressed the longings and frustrations of Eastern European Jewish life at a time when the disintegration of its traditions and mass emigration to the USA were changing the old order. In particular, great Zionist feeling was aroused by his poem ‘Be-Ir ha-Haregah/In the City of Slaughter’ (1903), which was written after a pogrom. Bialik lived in Palestine from 1924.

After attending a Talmudic school and teaching for some years, Bialik settled in Odessa in 1900; he lived in Berlin 1921-24 before moving to Palestine. He translated many of the world's classics into Hebrew, including Cervantes' Don Quixote and Schiller's Wilhelm Tell, and co-founded the publishing house of Devir.