Avraham Uri Kovner — Association of Jews of Vilna and vicinity in Israel

Avraham Kovner (1842-1909), born in Vilna, was a journalist and literary critic of the Enlightenment period; he is considered the founder of Hebrew literary criticism. Towards the end of his life he was engaged to a non-Jewish woman and converted to Christianity. His older brother, Dr. Shaul Kovner (1837-1896) researched the history of medicine.

Kovner was born in Vilna in 1842; Vilna was the center of Jewish culture in the north-west of the Russian Empire. His father was a teacher and his mother ran a small business. The family was poor and was supported by Kovner's uncle, Mordechai Lazar. He studied in yeshivot in and around Minsk and became familiar with Russian, French and German literature, as a result of which he was expelled from the yeshiva. After his marriage he underwent a personal and intellectual crisis, changed his name to Albert Kovner and fled south to Kiev, leaving his wife and daughter behind. In Kiev he was exposed to the ideals of justice and liberty that were then predominant in Russian universities, influenced by the reforms taking place in Western Europe.

Several years later he moved to Odessa, the cosmopolitan port and began publishing critiques in Hebrew in Hamelitz. In 1865 he published an anthology of critiques Heker Davar, in which he accused Hebrew writers of provincialism, disconnection from social reality and verbosity; he aroused their anger and, in return, they boycotted him.

From: Wikipedia