(Mendele Moykher-Sforim; 1835–1917), Hebrew and Yiddish writer. Sholem Yankev Abramovitsh is acknowledged, almost universally, as the founder of modern artistic prose in Hebrew and Yiddish. Born to a middle-class family in the Belorussian town of Kapulye (Kopyl), he lost all familial support at the age of 15. After spending several years as a student at various yeshivas, he made an adventuresome, perilous trek south to Ukraine on foot and in the company of itinerant beggars, arriving in Kamenets Podolski in 1853, where he stayed for five years as a teacher and then as the son-in-law of a middle-class family. He cultivated the friendship of the few local exponents of the Haskalah (especially Avraham Ber Gottlober) and began writing on matters pertaining to education.
