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Inspired by the innovations in Russian picture books for children and by the revival of spoken Hebrew in Russia at the time, Shoshana Zlatopolsky Persitz (1893–1969) founded the Omanut Press in Moscow in 1917. Her aim was to make Hebrew the natural mother-tongue for Jewish children in Russia. She would accomplish this by providing children with the best of world literature. The two books highlighted here are by Scandinavian authors. They had been published previously in Russian by the Moscow-based book dealer and fine arts publisher Joseph Knebel (1854–1926). Knebel, an innovator in the publication of children’s books, understood the significance of pictorial learning and commissioned two major artists associated with the turn-of-the-century Mir iskusstva (World of Art) movement to illustrate them: Heorhiy (Georgy) Narbut illustrated Hans Christian Andersen’s The Nightingale (Nattergalen, 1843) in 1912 and Dmitrii Mitrokhin illustrated Richard Gustafsson’s The Ship and the Tugboat (Pråmen, 1877) in 1913. In reissuing these books as part of her “Gamliel Library,” Persitz reused Mitrokhin’s and Narbut’s illustrations and simply substituted the Russian texts for Hebrew and adapted the format accordingly. Cover and selected illustrations from both books follow.
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