Francis de Sales Lewental

Francis de Sales Lewental (1839 in Włocławek, Congress Poland – 24 September 1902 at Wiesbaden) was a Polish Jewish publisher.

In 1862 Lewental, the son of poor Jewish parents, bought with his accumulated savings the press of the Warsaw publisher Jan Glücksberg [pl] (died 1859), and began his career with the Kalendarz Ludowy, a popular almanac, which he continued until 1866.

In 1871 Lewental bought the Kółko Domowe, a home magazine, and transformed it into the popular Tygodnik Romansów i Powieści (discontinued in 1900).

Though he avoided politics he did not succeed in escaping a conflict with the Russian government; he was arrested in 1900, was compelled to discontinue all his publications, and was sentenced to deportation for three years to Odessa.

Lewental enjoyed the friendship of many literati, among them being J. I. Kraszewski, for whose release from imprisonment at Magdeburg he offered to furnish the bail required by the Prussian government.