Solomon Mikhoels

Also: MIHOELS, SOLOMON B. MOSES · Michoels, Salomon · Michoels, Shlomo · Michoels, Solomon Mikhailovich · Michoels, Š. · Michoels, Šelomo · Michoėls, Solomon Michajlovič · Michoėls, Šlojme

(1890–1948), Yiddish actor, director of the Moscow State Yiddish Theater (Gosudarstvennyi Evreiskii Teatr; GOSET), and chair of the Soviet Jewish Anti-Fascist Committee. Solomon Mikhoels (Shloyme Vovsi) was born into an Orthodox Jewish family in Dvinsk. After receiving a heder education, he studied at a Realschule in Riga, the Kiev Commerce Institute, and, from 1915, at the law faculty of Petrograd University. In 1918, he enrolled in Aleksandr Granovskii’s Jewish chamber theater, which later became the Moscow State Yiddish Theater.