Tkatch, Meir Ziml

TKATCH, MEIR ZIML (1894–1967), Yiddish poet. Born in Priborsk (Ukraine), Tkatch immigrated to New York in 1913. He began his literary career with Russian lyrics in 1914, later changing to Yiddish, in which language he published poems and fables in dozens of Yiddish periodicals, and nine volumes of poetry between 1927 and 1960. In 1963 he published his selected poetry in the two-volume Mayn Hob un Gob ("My Belongings and Bounty," 1962–63); additionally, Elterfrukht fun Yugntsvit ("Old Age's Fruit from Youth's Bloom," 1971) and Eygns un Fremds ("One's Own and Another's," 1977). Tkatch's fables, among the finest in Yiddish, are cast in the form of dialogues and miniature dramas. Each teaches a lesson by means of a vivid picture of animal life and affords bitter insight into the psychic realms that are the substratum of human behavior. Tkatch's mastery of difficult verse forms is also evident in his sonnet sequences, triolets, and translations of Yessenin and Robert Frost.

BIBLIOGRAPHY:

LNYL, 4 (1960), 111–12; J. Glatstein, In Tokh Genumen (1947), 266–72; I.Ḥ. Biletzki, Massot (1963), 106–12; Y. Yeshurin, Meyer Ziml Tkatsh Bibliografye (1963).