We’re Laughing Our Heads Off

Born in the town of Holoskovo, near Odessa, Leyb Kvitko was a Soviet Yiddish poet of significant standing and lasting popularity. Praised for his early verse that combined the demands of modernism with the traditions of East European Jewish folksong, he was a member of the Kultur-lige (Culture League) literary group in Kiev and, like many of this circle, spent much of the 1920s in Berlin. Kvitko fell from favor a few years after his return to the Soviet Union when he published a critical caricature of Moyshe Litvakov, the editor of the Communist Party organ Der emes (The Truth), and was subsequently limited to writing children’s poetry. His children’s verse was, in turn, translated into Russian and became beloved by millions of Soviet readers for generations. A member of the Jewish Anti-Fascist Committee, Kvitko was executed alongside other Soviet Yiddish intellectuals on August 12, 1952.