Vilna as a Centre of the Modern Jewish Press, 1840-1928

Vilna (Polish Wilno), modern Vilnius and capital of Lithuania, was the traditional spiritual and intellectual centre of Jewish thought in the Russian Empire. It was often referred to as the 'Jerusalem of Lithuania', a term that has now come to stand for the lost world of Jewish life in Europe. Most people today learned what they know about this Vilna from autobiographies or personal memoirs. This book takes a more objective look at how Vilna became a uniquely important centre of the Jewish press. In particular it follows the development of the Jewish press within the context of modernising Imperial Russia during the second half of the nineteenth century. Vilna is revealed as an important centre for the Jewish Socialist movement, the Bund, towards the turn of the nineteenth century and in the years running up to the 1905 Revolution. Bundist journalism is discovered to be the sponsor of a Jewish cultural ideology called Yiddishism.

The Author: Susanne Marten-Finnis studied general linguistics, translation and interpreting, Russian language and literature and English language and American literature at Leipzig University. She completed a postgraduate degree in Media Studies at Tübingen University followed by a Ph.D. in Applied Linguistics. In 1995 she joined the Queen-s University of Belfast, where she is now a Reader in German Studies. Her main area of research is the Jewish press in Central and Eastern Europe before the Second World War.

Contents: Vilna as a Centre of the Haskalah - Vilna as a Centre of Bundist Journalism, 1895-1906 - Bundist Journalism as a Champion of Yiddishism, 1906-28 - Appendix listing the Vilna-based dailies and periodicals up until 1922 - Index of editors and contributors and the present location of most issues of each press item.