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<Literary Activity.
For the many poets and novelists who wrote in English see *Canadian Literature.
[Jewish Yiddish writers]
J. I. *Siegel, a Montrealer, was considered one of the foremost Yiddish poets. Melech *Ravitch, Yiddish essayist and poet, though his formative years were spent in Poland, settled in Montreal during World War II and considered himself a Canadian Jewish writer. Moishe M. Shaffir, born in Bukovina but in Montreal from 1929, published several volumes of Yiddish verse. Benjamin G. *Sack of Montreal and Abraham Rhinewine (1887-1932) of Toronto both combined Yiddish journalism and writing on Canadian Jewish history.> (col. 112)
Samson Dunsky translated into Yiddish and wrote a commentary on Ecclesiastes; Simcha Petrushka (1893-1950) of Montreal translated the Mishnah into Yiddish; and Isaiah Rabinovich of Toronto was a noted Hebrew essayist. Mark Selchen (1885-1960) and Israel Rabinowitz (1895-1964) were editors of Yiddish papers in Winnipeg and Montreal respectively; the latter wrote widely on Jewish music. Other Yiddish essayists, memoir writers, and poets were Sholem *Shtern, Shlomo Wiseman, Jacob Zipper, Rachel Korn, Moshe Menachovsky (1893-1969), and Gershon Pomerantz (1902-1968). Ida *Maze wrote children's poetry. Nachman Shemen wrote a series of volumes on Hasidism and on the Jewish attitude to labor, women, strangers, and proselytes [[converted]].
Press.
In 1897 the Jewish Times was founded as a weekly by a number of communal figures, including S.W. *Jacobs and Lyon *Cohen. Its editor until his death in 1910 was a gentile of Irish origin, Carrol Ryan. This publication was a national periodical, reflecting much of what went on in Jewish life throughout Canada.
In 1909 its name was changes to Canadian Jewish Times and in 1915 it merged with the Canadian Jewish Chronicle (1914-65), published by Hirsh Wolofsky.
In 1921 the Canadian Jewish Review began publication in Toronto, later moving to Montreal. Its publisher was George Cohen and its editor his wife, Florence Friedlander Cohen. The Jewish Standard was founded in Toronto in 1930 by Rose Dunkelman, and Meyer *Weisgal was its first editor; from 1938 its editor-publisher was Julius Hayman.
In 1966 the Canadian Jewish Chronicle merged with the Canadian Jewish Review as the Canadian Jewish Chronicle-Review and is published in both Toronto and Montreal. Stanley Shenkman is publisher.
The Canadian Jewish News, a weekly, has been published in Toronto since 1960 by Meyer J. Nurenberger. Best known of Canadian daily Yiddish papers was the Keneder Adler, or Canadian Jewish Eagle, published from 1907 in Montreal, though later a weekly.
The Hebrew Journal, founded in 1912, was published as a daily in Toronto until the late 1960s, when it, too, became a weekly. It is significant that at a time when the provincial Yiddish dailies of Boston, Philadelphia, and Chicago had expired, Toronto, Montreal, and New York alone of all North American cities had Yiddish dailies, which continued publication for about twenty years. However, eventually they, too, were reduced to weeklies. Winnipeg has three Jewish weeklies, two English and one Yiddish, and Vancouver has one English weekly, The Jewish Western Bulletin. The Yiddish Vochenblatt, published in Toronto, is a Leftist organ and was preceded by Der Kampf, which dates to the 1920s.> (col. 113)
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