Shmu’el Hanagid (993 – 1056)
The major poets of the period emerge in the third generation, and they are masters of their art in every respect and giants in the history of Hebrew literature.… More
Moshe Ibn Ezra (c. 1055 — after 1138)
Balance, calm employment of ornament, clarity of presentation as well as emotion—these are the traits that characterize the poetry of the third major poet of the period, Moshe Ibn… More
Drowning in Apathy
Polar bears are the largest land carnivores, reaching mythic proportions: 12 feet high, 2,000 pounds. They have 42 ivory teeth, and their paws are 12 inches wide, with curved,… More
Todros Abulafia (1247 – after 1300)
A distant relative of Meir HaLevi Abulafia, but no relation to Avraham, Todros Ben Yehuda Abulafia was born in Toledo in 1247 and spent most of his life in… More
Yehuda Halevi (c. 1075 – 1141)
An unrivalled master of Hebrew and its prosody, Yehuda Halevi is perhaps the most famous and certainly the most revered of all the medieval poets. “The quintessence and embodiment… More
International PEN Report on Translation and Globalization
In Act I, scene iii of Richard II, the Duke of Norfolk is banished from England—sent into exile “never to return.” Curiously, his first thought on hearing this harsh… More
Greeting, Slippage, and Shaping
As someone specifically interested in the translation of poetry, of the free verse variety, I will come down squarely on the side of occasional long shots, slippages into the… More
Subject Matter
I am Eikoh Hosoe, a photographer from Tokyo. It is a great honor for me to speak on this special occasion about my collection of photographs of Ba-ra-kei, or… More
Diverse Realities
Hearing this story, I thought to myself: This is straight out of Gabriel García Márquez. It was an epiphany for me. I suddenly saw García Márquez’s fiction on a… More
Old-Fasioned Virtues
It was the spring of 1970. I was twenty-three years old, writing and translating poems, writing essays and reviews, but also dreaming of one day being able to write… More