Nahum Meir Schaikewitz
Nahum Meir Schaikewitz, better known as Shomer, was born December 18, 1849, in Nesvizh (then part of the Russian Empire) and died November 25, 1905, in New York City. He was a famous Yiddish and Hebrew novelist and playwright, once called the Dumas of Yiddish literature. Some critics, including Sholem Aleichem, argued that his plots were extravagantly artificial. Because of his popular style, his work has sometimes been labeled shund literature, and he is seen by some as a pioneer of that genre.
As a boy he showed a gift for storytelling. He began writing Hebrew short stories for Ha-Meliẓ and befriended Hebrew writers such as Ẓebi Hirsch Scherschewski and Dobsevage. He later worked as a business manager in Vilnius and traveled widely. While in Bucharest he became inspired by the Jewish theater and decided to become a dramatic author. He settled in Odessa, where he managed theater productions and wrote plays for the Mariinski Theatre. His successful play Der Rewizor (Odessa, 1883), an adaptation of Gogol’s The Government Inspector, demonstrated his talent.
When the Jewish theater was shut down in Russia, Schaikewitz moved to New York in 1888 and edited two Yiddish weeklies, Der Menschenfreund and Der Jüdischer Puck. He wrote Hebrew novels about Jewish life in Russian towns, including Mumar le-Hak’is (1879), Kewiyah Taḥat Kewiyah and Ta’ut Goi (1880), Ha-Niddaḥat (1886–1887), and Ḳayin (1887), which dealt with life in Portugal. He became especially known for his Yiddish fiction, producing more than two hundred novels, many of them about life in small towns and villages in 19th-century Russia. His plain, accessible language helped bring his readers together and he is credited with broadening the audience for Yiddish literature. Among his popular titles were Der Ḳaṭorzḥnikh, Der Blutiger Adieu, and Der Frumer Merder. Many of his historical stories also appeared in Yiddish newspapers.
Schaikewitz wrote more than thirty plays, staged first in Russia and later in New York. Notable works include Tisza-Eslar, about the blood accusation in that Hungarian town, as well as Der Bel Tchuve (The Penitent) and Trefnyak (The Impure One). He faced harsh attacks from critics such as S. Rabinovitz, who used the pen name Shomer’s Mishpaṭ to challenge him. Schaikewitz answered back with a pamphlet, Yehi Or (1898), arguing that he aimed to please all readers, from the householder to the servant who could not understand the later Yiddish writers. Jacob Adler later commented that Schaikewitz’s melodramas were rough, but their humor felt believable.
At his funeral, around 100,000 people are said to have joined the procession in two locations, during a period when other large public demonstrations, known as the Great Troyer March, were taking place nearby.
This page was last edited on 2 February 2026, at 07:49 (CET).