PREGER, JACOB

PREGER, JACOB (1887–1942), Yiddish playwright, poet, and short story writer. Preger was born in Kobrin, Belorussia, and raised in Drogichin and Warsaw. His reputation is based largely on two highly successful plays, Der Nisoyen ("The Temptation," 1925) and Simkhe Plakhte ("Simkhe the Rag," 1935), a comedy produced by Maurice Schwartz in the U.S. under the title Der Vasertreger ("The Watercarrier"). His published verse includes Oyf di Vegn ("On the Roads," 1914), Oyfn Veg ("On the Road," 1919), and Shloyme Hameylekh ("King Solomon," 1932), a "dramatic poem in three acts." Preger's art is rooted in folklore and the popular imagination. He is reported to have been killed by the Germans in Otwock. -BIBLIOGRAPHY: LNYL, 7 (1968), 227–8; Z. Zylbercweig, Leksikon fun Yidishn Teater, 3 (1959), 1888–94. ADD. BIBLIOGRAPHY: M. Ravitch, Mayn Leksikon, 1 (1945). (Leonard Prager)