Background
Imber was born on December 27, 1856 in Złoczów (now Zolochiv, Ukraine). He was the son of Samuel Jacob Imber, his orthodox parents were poor. His childhood was spent in extreme poverty amidst a religiously fanatical environment.
(This is a reproduction of a book published before 1923. T...)
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(Book by Imber, Naphtali Herz)
Book by Imber, Naphtali Herz
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Imber was born on December 27, 1856 in Złoczów (now Zolochiv, Ukraine). He was the son of Samuel Jacob Imber, his orthodox parents were poor. His childhood was spent in extreme poverty amidst a religiously fanatical environment.
His education was restricted to Hebrew and the Talmud. He also studied under excellent teachers in the city of Brody.
At the age of ten Imber was already composing poems in Hebrew, and one of them, dedicated to the Emperor Franz Josef on the occasion of the annexation of Bukowina to the Austrian Empire, won imperial recognition and a gift of money for the young author.
At the age of fifteen, he began a life of wandering which was to cease only with his death. He visited the city of Brody, then proceeded to Lemberg, where Rabbi Dr. Bernhard Lowenstein, perceiving his unusual talents, took him under his care and provided him with excellent teachers. The restless youth remained only half a year, however, after which he went to Vienna. During the next few years he wandered through Hungary, Serbia, and Romania, remaining in the latter country for a lengthy period and supporting himself by giving private lessons.
At the end of the Russo-Turkish war he arrived in Constantinople. Here he met Mr. and Mrs. Laurence Oliphant, who were attempting to obtain permission from the sultan to found a Jewish settlement in Palestine. Imber became their secretary, and settled down with them at Haifa, near Mount Carmel, until Oliphant died in 1888. During this period he wrote frequently for Hazebi and Habazeleth, the two Hebrew periodicals in Jerusalem.
After Oliphant's death he resumed his wandering through Europe, finally turning up in London. Here he struck up a friendship with Israel Zangwill, whom he undertook to teach Hebrew in return for lessons in English. Imber was soon able to contribute articles to the Jewish Standard then edited by Zangwill, while the latter translated into English one of Imber's poems entitled "The Watch on the Jordan" (Mishmar ha-Yarden). It is claimed that the comic poet Melchizedek Pinchas whom Zangwill introduced into his Children of the Ghetto is a portrait drawn from Imber. Imber remained only about four years in England.
In 1892 he left for the United States. Here he continued his vagrant existence. He went to Boston (where he edited a journal, Uriel), Chicago, San Francisco, Los Angeles, and other cities, everywhere seeking to make the acquaintance of persons interested in mysticism, on which subject he afterwards wrote several treatises. Later he returned to the East Side of New York, in whose saloons and cafés he soon became known as a popular and eccentric figure.
He translated into Hebrew Fitzgerald's Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam under the title Ha-kos (New York, 1905). His writings in English include two treatises, "Education and the Talmud" and "The Alphabet of Rabbi Akiba, " which appeared in the Report of the United States commissioner of education for the years 1894-95 and 1895-96.
Naphtali Herz Imber won recognition in modern Hebrew literature as a national poet. His stirring poem Hatikvah ("The Hope") was adopted as the national anthem of the Zionists. A fiery nationalism was not Imber's only mood, however. His mastery of Hebrew verse is equally well displayed in his skillful light compositions. His famous Hebrew national poems are contained in Barkai (1886), Barkai he-hadash (1900), and Barkai ha-shlishi (1904).
(This is a reproduction of a book published before 1923. T...)
(Book by Imber, Naphtali Herz)
Imber said that he wished to do away with the lamentations in the spirit of Jeremiah, which occupied so large a place in Hebrew poetry, and introduce the pagan spirit of love and wine.
His poems express the hope of Zion and sound a battlecry in the struggle for a new Jerusalem.
His contemporaries describe him as a brilliant and fascinating personality, blood brother to the troubadours or minnesingers, with the careless virtues and indulgent excesses of a François Villon. His addiction to strong drink, his inordinate vanity and other weaknesses were the current gossip of New York's East Side, but the price of a drink was little enough recompense for the stream of wit and wisdom which the poet would always turn on upon request. His total inability to make any financial provision for himself would have left him absolutely destitute had it not been for Judge Mayer Sulzberger, who allotted him a monthly stipend.
At the age of forty-four Imber married Dr. Amanda Katie Davidson, a highly cultured woman, but the union did not last.
