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Sholem Asch
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Polish-Jewish novelist, dramatist, and essayist in the Yiddish language (1880-1957)
OverviewAI-generated
Sholem Asch (1880–1957) was a writer, novelist, short story writer, and playwright who wrote in Yiddish, Polish, English, and Hebrew. Born in Kutno, he held citizenship in the Russian Empire, Poland, the United States, and Israel. He died in London. His literary career began in 1899, and he worked in the fields of prose, drama, and journalism.
Asch was nominated for the Nobel Prize in Literature and received the Anisfield-Wolf Book Awards. He is described by the Jewish Encyclopedia of Brockhaus and Efron. His notable works include *Die Familie Grossglück*, *Night*, *מייו רייזע איבער שפאניען*, *הימעל און ערד*, and *Gezamelṭe shriften*. His archives are held at the Beinecke Rare Book & Manuscript Library at Yale University. He had two children, Moses Asch and Nathan Asch.
Synthesized by Vinony from 26 facts across 3 sources: Wikidata, Open Library, Europeana Sparql. Generated from structured data (not the Wikipedia text) and checked against those facts — may still contain errors.
Person · Open Library
- Born
- 1880
- Died
- 1957
- Works
- 506
Top works
- Ḳoyln
- Ein Glaubensmartyrium
- Théâtre yiddish
- Momenten
- Derrière le mur
via Open Library + Wikidata
Key facts
- Born
- Szalom Asz , 1 November 1880, Kutno , Congress Poland , Russian Empire
- Died
- 10 July 1957 (1957-07-10) (aged 76), London , England
- Other names
- Szalom Asz, Shalom Asch, Shalom Ash
- Occupations
- Novelist dramatist essayist
via Wikipedia infobox
Wikidata facts
- Instance of
- human
- Gender
- male
- Citizenship
- Russian Empire
- Place of birth
- Kutno
- Place of death
- London
- Child
- Moses Asch
- Occupation
- journalist
- Languages spoken
- Hebrew
- Native language
- Yiddish
- Field of work
- journalism
- Genre
- drama
- Image
- Sholem Asch.jpg
Show 8 more facts
- Commons category
- Sholem Asch
- date of birth
- 1880-01-01
- date of death
- 1957-07-10
- nominated for
- Nobel Prize in Literature
- archives at
- Yale University
- name in native language
- שלום אש
- start of work period
- 1899-00-00
- writing language
- Yiddish
via Wikidata · CC0
Works in European collections
6 objects attributed to Sholem Asch, held across European museums, libraries & archives · via Europeana
~21 min read
Encyclopedic overview
Sholem Asch (Yiddish: שלום אַש, Polish: Szalom Asz; 1 November 1880 – 10 July 1957), also written Shalom Ash, was a Polish-Jewish novelist, dramatist, and essayist in the Yiddish language who settled in the United States. A prolific and widely translated writer, Asch wrote about Jewish life in Eastern Europe and America, producing novels, short stories, and plays that reached international audiences. Asch initially wrote in Hebrew, but, on the advice of the Yiddish writer I.L. Peretz, he subsequently decided to write only in Yiddish, becoming a significant cultural figure in the Yiddishist movement.
Asch's career was marked by both critical acclaim and controversy. His 1904 work A Shtetl offered an idyllic portrait of traditional Polish-Jewish life. In 1920, a 12-volume set of his collected works was published in honor of his 40th birthday. His 1906 play God of Vengeance, set in a Jewish brothel and featuring a lesbian relationship, sparked fierce debates both within the Jewish community and the greater political landscape. God of Vengeance encountered bans, arrests, and an obscenity trial when it played on Broadway in 1923. Lord Chamberlain banned the London production in 1946. Asch's trilogy Three Cities (1929–31) chronicled Jewish life in St. Petersburg, Warsaw, and Moscow. Asch was awarded Poland's Polonia Restituta decoration in 1932.
Excerpted from Wikipedia’s “Sholem Asch” article, available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 licence.