KASSEL, DAVID

KASSEL, DAVID (pseudonym of Dovid Kisel; 1881–1935), Yiddish writer. Born in Minsk, he was influenced by the bund , in whose publications his first poems appeared. After marrying the poet Sarah Reisen, sister of abraham reisen , he settled in Warsaw and attracted attention with his short stories and novels, In Dorf ("In the Village," 1912); Unter a Vaysn Forhang ("Behind a White Curtain," 1922), and On an Oysveg ("No Way Out," 1922). He also wrote a series of popular textbooks, prose anthologies, and translations of Tolstoy, Lermontov, and Jules Verne. His autobiographical novella Moysheles Kinderyorn ("Moyshele's Childhood," 1921. was a pioneering work in Yiddish children's literature. -BIBLIOGRAPHY: A. Reisen, Epizodn fun Mayn Lebn, 2 vols. (1929), passim; Rejzen, Leksikon, 3 (1929), 482–8; J.S. Hertz (ed.), Doyres Bundistn, 1 (1956), 420–2. ADD. BIBLIOGRAPHY: LNYL, 8 (1981), 84–7; Sh. Niger, Shmuesn vegn Bikher (1922), 295–303. (Moshe Starkman)