Sholem Aleichem (Solomon Naumovich (Nokhumovich) Rabinovich) was a Jewish writer, playwright, and educator, one of the founders of modern Yiddish literature. His works became a vivid encyclopedia of Jewish life, and his unique humor and delicate lyricism earned him worldwide acclaim, leading many to compare him with Mark Twain.
Early YearsSolomon Rabinovich was born on 2 March 1859 in Pereiaslav, near Kyiv, into a poor Jewish family; his father was a small shopkeeper. He spent his childhood in the town of Voronkov in the Poltava province, where he studied at a Jewish religious elementary school. When he was 13, his mother died, and his stepmother’s arrival prompted his first satirical attempts. By the age of 15, Solomon had decided to become a writer. It was then that he invented the pseudonym Sholem Aleichem (meaning “peace be upon you”) to conceal his literary pursuits from his family.

After completing school in 1876, he spent three years tutoring Olga Loewe, the daughter of a wealthy businessman; they married in 1883. During this period, his first published works in Yiddish appeared — the novella “Two Stones” and the short story “The Elections.”
Creative PathThe writer’s life was full of hardships, yet equally rich in creativity. He spent part of his wife’s inheritance on literary efforts, publishing almanacs and paying honoraria to authors, and lost part of it on the stock exchange. Due to financial and political difficulties, the family lived in various Ukrainian cities: Bila Tserkva, Kyiv, Odesa, and Lviv.

From 1891 to 1893, Sholem Aleichem lived in Odesa, where the second period of his literary work began. Here, he founded the journal Kol Mevasser (“The Heralding Voice”) and was published in local newspapers such as Odeskyi Listok and Odeski Novyny. Odesa inspired the writer to create works like “Menahem-Mendl,” “Three Calendars,” and “Grandfather’s Inn,” in which he humorously portrayed the vitality and optimism of the city’s residents.

Sholem Aleichem’s writings are infused with Ukrainian cultural elements — they feature descriptions of Ukrainian landscapes, vocabulary, and folklore. Although most of the events he described took place in Ukraine, Ukrainian cities and their inhabitants serve mainly as a backdrop against which the drama of Jewish life unfolds.

A short story in Yiddish, with a portrait of the author and a caption