Rokhl Korn (1898‒1982) was born on 15 January near Podliski, East Galicia, on the farming estate Sucha Gora (Dry Mountain). She is a significant figure in modern Yiddish literature, and was a narrative writer of both verse and prose, and a poet, publishing eight volumes of poetry and two fiction collections. Korn was educated mostly in Polish, the language her family spoke at home. Her isolated childhood was a foundational influence on her inclination towards writing, although she found later that her father, before he died, had also written poetry and philosophical essays -- suggesting to her where she had inherited her natural inclination towards writing. In the two completed chapters of her memoir, My Home and I, she describes the lives of her parents. When WWI began, Korn’s family fled to Vienna. Afterwards, they returned to live in Przemysl, staying there from 1918 to 1941. Korn’s first ever publications were in a Zionist newspaper and a socialist journal in Polish, but due to pogroms against the Jews of Poland, she began to write in Yiddish -- taught to speak, read, and write the language by her husband, whom she had married in 1920. Korn made consistent written contributions to various Yiddish literary journals and newspapers through the 1920s and 30s, becoming known as an accomplished writer through her early volumes of poetry, Dorf [Village] (1928), Router mon [Red Poppies] (1937), and her initial collection of stories, Erd [Land] (1936). Korn became a Soviet citizen during the Nazi-Soviet pact, joining the Soviet Writers’ Union. Shortly before the Germans invaded in 1941, Korn left Przemysl to go to her daughter in Lvov; unable to contact them, she left behind her husband, mother, and her brothers and their families, who all died in the war. Korn and her daughter moved a few times over the next few years as her daughter attended medical school, and Korn continued writing. She and her daughter eventually returned to Poland, and after a short period in Stockholm, Sweden, Korn obtained the necessary visas to emigrate to Canada, with the help of Ida Maze. She, her daughter, and her son-in-law settled in Montreal in 1948. Korn won many prizes and awards for her writing, and her poetry and some stories have been translated to many languages. Korn died in Montreal on 9 September, 1982.
Sources:
Levitan, Seymour. “Rokhl Häring Korn.” Jewish Women: A Comprehensive Historical Encyclopedia. Jewish Women’s Archive, 27 February 2009, jwa.org/encyclopedia/article/korn-rokhl-haring.