Nahum Meir Schaikewitz

Nahum Meïr Schaikewitz,[1] also known by his pseudonym "Shomer" (December 18, 1849 in Nesvizh, Russian Empire – 25 November 1905 in New York City)[2] was a Yiddish and Hebrew novelist and playwright.

His play Der Rewizor (Odessa, 1883), an adaptation from Gogol's Revizor (The Government Inspector), proved very successful and showed Schaikewitz's talent as a writer.

As his language is simple, just as was spoken by the Jewish masses in Lithuania, his novels had the effect of greatly decreasing the fanaticism which prevailed in the small rural and urban communities.

[4] Over thirty of Schaikewitz's plays were produced, first in Russia, then in New York, among them being one entitled Tisza-Eslar, on the subject of the blood accusation brought in the Hungarian town of that name.

He was the subject of vitriolic attacks by S. Rabinovitz ("Sholem Aleichem"), who directed against him his Shomer's Mishpaṭ (Berdychev, 1888), reproaching him for his literary deficiencies.

Schaikewitz successfully defended himself in a pamphlet entitled Yehi Or (New York, 1898), showing that his literary problem was to satisfy every plane of intelligence, from the householder to the servant-girl who could not understand the works of the later Yiddish writers.

[9] It is unclear if the crowds at Schaikewitz's funeral procession independently or organized by various Jewish groups active at the time.