Eliezer Chaim Bloom (also known by the pen name of B. Alquit) was born in Chelm, Poland in 1896. He was orphaned at an early age and received his education in Lublin, Warsaw, and Vienna. He immigrated to the US in 1914, where he first worked as a tailor in a sweatshop. He began his writing career as a poet at 1920, when he joined Leiles Glatstein Minkov’s group Einzich. He was a valued group member and between 1934 and 1938 also a co-editor of the Einzich magazine. His book of poetry, Vagen Tzvai Un Andara (On Two and Others) debuted in 1931, and in 1958, a collection of his short stories titled Oifen vag tzum Peretz Skver (On the Way to Peretz Square), was also published. After his death in 1963 his poems were published in a volume titled Lidar (Poems, 1964). “The Big Light” is taken from On the Way to Peretz Square.
