Solomon Simon (author) was born in 1895, in Kalinkovitch, now in Belarus. He came to New York in 1913. Over the course of his career, he served as as president of the Sholem Aleichem Folk Institute, which ran a secular Yiddish school system and a press, as editor of Kinder Zhurnal, as a regular contributor to numerous newspapers and literary journals, and as the author of 20 full-length Yiddish books. The English translation of his Di Heldn fun Khelm, titled The Wise Men of Helm and Their Merry Tales, was a classic in its time and is still in print today.
Though Simon was best known as a writer of children’s books, his interests ranged well beyond. The subjects of his books and essays included Torah commentary, memoirs, Israel and Zionism, education, Jewish literature, and the problems of Jewish life in the modern world. In addition to his educational and literary work, he was a full time dentist. He died in November, 1970.
David Forman (translator) is Solomon Simon’s grandson. He began studying Yiddish in his fifties. He has described and cataloged Yiddish materials for Cornell University Library and has taught beginning Yiddish language classes privately, in adult education classes, and at Cornell University. His English translation of Simon’s Dos Kluge Shnayderl was published in a bilingual edition as The Clever Little Tailor. He is also a poet.
The Nation State and the Promised Land 