About
Ludwik Lejzer Zamenhof was born in Białystok, in the Russian Empire, into a Jewish family. Trained as an ophthalmologist, he practiced medicine among the poor Jewish communities of Warsaw. In 1887, under the pseudonym Doktoro Esperanto, he published the Unua Libro, which presented the sixteen grammar rules and nine hundred root words of his international language. The Fundamento de Esperanto (1905) established its unchangeable basis, adopted at the first World Esperanto Congress in Boulogne-sur-Mer. Zamenhof translated into Esperanto the Hebrew Bible, Shakespeare's Hamlet, and works by Molière, Goethe, Schiller, and Andersen. He renounced leadership of the movement in 1912 and died in Warsaw in 1917.
* 1859-12-15 — † 1917-04-14
Major works
- Unua Libro (1887)language manual
- Fundamento de Esperanto (1905)reference work
- La Hebrea Biblio (traduction)translation
- Hamleto (traduction)translation
Key milestones
- 1887Publication of the Unua Libro in Warsaw, introducing Esperanto.
- 1905First World Esperanto Congress in Boulogne-sur-Mer, where the Fundamento was declared the unchangeable basis.
- 1912Renounced formal leadership of the Esperanto movement at the Kraków Congress.
Themes
International languagePeace and understanding among peoplEsperantoLiterary translationJewish identity and tolerance
Sources: britannica.com · oxfordbibliographies.com · jewishencyclopedia.herokuapp.com
