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[JEWISH PEOPLE] Kogda Izrail’ umiraet [i.e. When Israel Dies]

Lecache, B.

Leningrad: Priboi, 1928. Item #1853

142 pp.: ill.+[2] pp. of ads. 20x14 cm. In original illustrated wrappers by unknown artist. Rubbed, pale water stains and some foxing, tears of spine with some fragments lost, some pencil notes, bookplate of private Jewish library on rear side of front cover, otherwise good.

One of 3000 copies.
Russian edition of the first part of Bernard Lecache’s trilogy on the suffering of the Jews of Russia and Ukraine during the Civil War – ‘Au pays des pogroms’ [In the Land of Pogroms]. The first volume, ‘Quand Israel meurt’ (1927) was translated into Russian by N.I. Iavne. The foreword is written by Iu. Larin.
In 1926, the Jewish anarchist Sholom Schwartzbard killed Ukrainian military leader Symon Petliura, accused of starting pogroms earlier. Lecache went to Ukraine as a journalist investigating pogroms. It influenced him to start the trilogy published in 1927-1933.
At one time Bernard Lecache (1895-1968) was expelled from the French Communist Party but he was still close to them and chaired a meeting for the 10th anniversary of the Russian Revolution in 1927. The same year, he founded the International League Against Pogroms [later – against Anti-Semitism]. This translation was printed in 1928. In it, Whites, Petliura and his Polish allies were responsible for all murders of Jews. The book contains photographs of victims of the massacre; captions determined who from Bolshevik’s opposition had made those things depicted. In 1928, Lecache became a member of the Association of Friends of the Soviet Union.
Of the three volumes of the trilogy, only the first one was published in the USSR. At the end, an advertisement announces printing Lecache’s book “Poland without Mask”.

Worldcat shows the only copy located in Stanford University.

Price: $750.00