orig. Sholem Yakov Rabinowitz
born Feb. 18, 1859, Pereyaslav, Russia
died May 13, 1916, New York, N.Y., U.S.
Russian writer.
Drawn to writing as a youth, he became a private tutor at age 17 and later served as a government rabbi. Beginning in 1883 he published more than 40 widely translated volumes of novels, stories, and plays in Yiddish. English translations from his 14-volume collected works include Jewish Children and The Old Country . His best-known character, Tevye the dairyman, was the subject of a volume of short stories that later was the basis for the musical Fiddler on the Roof (1964).