BERDICHEVSKY (BENGORION), MICAH JOSEPH

(1865-1921)

   Ukranian Hebrew writer. He lived in Breslau and Berlin. In his writings he attacked the limited scope of Hebrew literature, the inadequacy of Haskalah, the ideology of Ahad ha-Am, and Hibbat Zion. Influenced by Nietzsche, he called for a re-evaluation of Judaism and Jewish history and the expansion of the canons of Hebrew literary taste. His fiction depicts Jewish towns of eastern Europe at the end of the 19th century and the life of eastern European Jewish students in the cities of central and western Europe.