Bialik Hayim Nahman (1873-1934) was a great Jewish poet who wrote mostly in Hebrew. From the age of 13, he had studied the holy books of Judaism. Influenced by the Jewish Haskalah and literary enlightenment movements, he enrolled in the Yeshiva of Volozhin in order to receive a general education. However, general subjects were not taught in the yeshiva, and so Bialik, after a brief interest in theology, took up self-education and, in particular, began to study Russian by himself. Bialik considered Ahad-ha-Ama (Hebrew: 'One of the People', real name Ginzberg Asher Hirsch; 1856-1927), an ideologist of 'spiritual Zionism', his teacher, who called for Palestine to become the spiritual and cultural centre of the Jewish people. At the yeshiva Bialik was inspired by Palestinophile ideas and formed a secret society, whose aim was the 'promotion of Jewish settlement in Israel' and criticism of assimilation, which Bialik described as national treason. In 1892, he made his debut with a poem called 'El ha-tzipor' (To the swallow), which set two main themes in Bialik's oeuvre - a description of the degraded lives of Jews in Eastern Europe and an expression of longing for Zion. According to the Russian Jewish Encyclopaedia (early 20th century), it was “the first national-Zionist poem. From 1893 Bialik taught Jewish subjects in a school in Sosnowice, Lublin province. At that time, he wrote his first denunciatory poem in the style of the prophets of the Bible, 'Akhen hatsir ha-am' (Like dry grass), which opened the famous 'Songs of Wrath' cycle. The poem became popular and Bialik moved to Odessa. In 1902, Bialik's first collection of poems was published. In 1903 the Odessa Public Committee sent Bialik to Kishinev to collect first-hand evidence about the atrocities committed during a pogrom. Inspired by what he saw, he wrote the poem 'Be-ir ha-harega' (Tale of the Pogrom, published as 'Massa Nemirow' for censorship reasons), which inspired young Jews to organise self-defence groups and fight for the renewal of Jewish life. In 1911, a collection of Bialik's 'Songs and Poems' in translation by W. Jabotinsky was published in Russian. In 1916, Maxim Gorky spoke highly of Bialik in his article “About Bialik”. There were several articles about him in Latvia, and the left-wing Tsiray Tzionist Party was named after him. In 1925, Bialik emigrated to Palestine, where he continued to fight for Jewish interests in the USSR. In 1929, the newspaper “Segodnya” (Riga) reported that Bialik accused the Jewish activist R. Brainin of keeping silent about the Bolshevik crimes against Zionism and the Jews in the Soviet Union, and in 1932 Bialik protested against the support of part of the Jewish press for the Birobidzhan project (a plan to settle working-class Jews in the Far East). Bialik traveled to several European and American countries on behalf of leaders of the global Zionist movement. In 1931, he visited Latvia as part of of a European tour 'The Book and the Word', organised to raise interest in Hebrew and the culture of that language. On 8 December 1931, he travelled through Daugavpils, where he was greeted by representatives of Zionist youth organisations (“Gashomer Hatzair”, “Gordonia”) and some mainstream Jewish schools, then held several meetings with representatives of the Zionist movement in Latvia and non-Zionist organisations in Riga. On 17 December 1931, Bialik met his Zionist admirers (the United Socialist Zionist Party of Latvia and its youth organisations “Gashomer-Gatsair”, “Hehaluts”, “Gordonia”, “Borochov-yugend”, representatives of “Bialik Club”, general Zionists, revisionists and their youth societies “Betar” and “Avivia”, representatives of the women's Zionist organisation VICO, Zionist foundations, the teachers' organisation Hamore), non-Zionists (the Jewish community, the Jewish fraction of the Duma, the DISK sports organisation), representatives of Jewish schools, journalists, and Rogachev Rabbi Yosef Rozin (1858-1936). He also visited the DISK sports organisation and the local branch of the Zionist foundation “Keren Haesod” and gave a lecture in Yiddish on “The Book and the Word”. On 8th January 1933, “Bialik Month” was held in Latvia in honour of Bialik's 60th birthday, during which events dedicated to Bialik and Jewish culture were held.