Career
A biographical information about L. Talalai is very small. We only know that in 1925-1926 he worked as a
teacher in Vendarazskai Primary School in Magileuskaya Voblasts. In 1926-1928 he studied at the Vitebsk Training
College. In 1928-1932 he served in the Red Army (in other news, he served until
1937). In 1932-1936 L. Talalai was a
contributor of the Jewish newspaper «Unger Arbaiter» («A Young Worker»).
Afterwards he worked as a
teacher of Russian language and literature in high schools in Minsk. At the
beginning of the Great Patriotic War he was called up into the army, died at
the front in 1942.
Since 1929, his poems were
published in the journal «Shtern» («The Star»). He published two poetical books
in Jewish before the war in Minsk. They are «Moi Pershy Snop» («My first
sheaf») and «U Pakhodze» («In the Field»). The subject matter of poems by L. Talalay is
the life of the village, socialist changes in it, the readiness of soldiers to
defend their Motherland.The poet showed a tendency to the narrative poem in
poems such as «U Palyavim Shtabe» («At a Field Headquarters»), «Kalya Kuzni Dva
Matrosy…» («Near the Forge Are Two Sailors…») and others.