Jiri Langer

Jiri Langer was born in 1894 to a Jewish assimilated family in Prague. Attracted to the mysticism of the Chassidim, he became a devotee and assiduous chronicler of their way of life. His writings were banned and destroyed when the Nazis occupied Czechoslovakia but his legacy has subsequently been reaffirmed, and he has been recognised for teaching his friend Franz Kafka Hebrew. He was able to escape the Nazi invasion and fled to Palestine in 1939, but died in 1943 of illnesses brought on by the hardships of the journey.