Fir teg

Fir teg evolves around the events of the siege by Polish legionnaires of the Vilna Soviet of Workers Deputies in early 1919.^[1][4] Iulius is the central hero character.^[1] The name 'Four Days' refers to the days that Bolsheviks in Vilna (Vilnius) waited for the arrival of the Red Army to aid them.^[1] Within the Vilna Soviet, where most of the play is set, the Bolshevik characters debate with the nationalist socialist parties over the role of the Soviet.^[5] The Bolsheviks are betrayed by the General Jewish Labour Bund and the Polish Socialist Party, allowing the counter-revolutionaries to take control of the city.^[1] Faced with the betrayal of the other socialist parties, Iulius and other Bolshevik leaders chose to commit suicide rather than surrendering.^[1]

Whilst the play was critically acclaimed as the archetype of Yiddish revolutionary plays, the final suicide scene provoked controversy.^[1] Suicide was not the type of sacrifice that communist cultural movement would promote. Soviet critics argued that the revolution possesses no tragedy, solely heroism.^[4] Veidlinger (in Bliss Eaton (2002)) argues that the final suicide scene invokes a Jewish historical motif, the mass suicide during the Siege of Masada.^[1] However, apart from the usage of Yiddish language, there was no overt Jewish themes in the play.^[1]

Fir teg was one of the main plays of the 1932-1933 season at the Artef theatre in New York City, directed by Benno Schneider.^[9] A short review in The New York Times stated that "[t]he story is beautifully narrated and equally well portrayed."^[9] In 1941 Fir teg was played for the first time in Vilnius, before the German attack on the city.^[10]