Gordon, Leon

Gordon, Leon, originally Judah Loeb Ben Asher (1831-1892), Russian-Jewish poet and novelist (Hebrew), was born at Wilna in 1831 and died at St Petersburg in 1892. He took a leading part in the modern revival of the Hebrew language and culture. His satires did much to rouse the Russian Jews to a new sense of the reality of life, and Gordon was the apostle of enlightenment in the Ghettos. His Hebrew style is classical and pure. His poems were collected in four volumes, Kol Shire Yehudah (St Petersburg, 1883-1884); his novels in Kol Kithbe Yehuda (Odessa, 1889).