May 13: Sholem Aleichem

The great Yiddish writer Sholem Aleichem (Solomon Rabinovich) died of tuberculosis and exhaustion on this date in 1916 at age 57 (see our Jewdayo entry for March 2, 2010). His New York funeral procession was witnessed by 100,000 mourners, and his ethical will was published by the New York Times and read into the Congressional Record. “Wherever I may die,” he wrote, “let me be buried not among the rich and famous, but among plain Jewish people, the workers, the common folk, so that my tombstone may honor the simple graves around me, and the simple graves honor mine, even as the plain people honored their folk writer in his lifetime.” Jews around the world celebrate his yortsayt with readings from his works, as he requested in the will: “Let my name be recalled with laughter, or not at all.”

“If you don’t work at anything, that’s work, too.” --Sholem Aleichem