Israeli Poetry of the Holocaust

This book is the first in English to address contemporary Israeli poetry of the Holocaust. The unique character of the book consists in its capacity to approach simultaneously the fervent feelings and scalding, emotional scars associated with the Holocaust and the aesthetic 'infrastructure' that is inlaid and operates in the very depth of the poems under consideration. In this respect, the book functions on two simultaneous levels: it views the emotional strata engaged with the Holocaust while analyzing its literary mechanism from an artistic perspective. The book also turns to the congruence between the very collective nature of contemporary Israeli poetry and the capacity to cope with the Holocaus while enlisting literary means. Hence contemporary Israeli poetry tends to display a poetic might while being also emotionally oriented. Memory of the Holocaust should never be dimmed by passing years nor by the fact that the last survivors are saying farewell to all earthly things. There are numerous ways to commemorate the Holocaust. This book introduces a very effective way to do so. One may wonder about combining the Holocaust with art. That doubt, however, is proven wrong by this book. Accordingly, it deftly illustrates how an artistic text can deliver the most scorching emotions of the Holocaust. This aesthetic dexterity does not cloud the Holocaust but rather introduces it in the most artistically challenging fashion. The fact that the Holocaust poetry discussed here is also Israeli poetry makes the book even more important and relevant. One may cogently argue that the sate of Israel was established on the ashes of the Holocaust. If so, the fact that contemporary Israeli poetry is dedicated to the topic of the Holocaust celebrates the victory of humankind over Nazi atrocities. This book should be of interest to students, teachers and scholars of the Holocaust, modern Hebrew/Israeli poetry, and literature in general.