YEHUDA AMICHAI was born in Wurzburg, Germany, in 1924 and emigrated with his family to Palestine in 1936. Amichai published eleven volumes of poetry in Hebrew, two novels, and a book of short stories. His work has been translated into thirty-seven languages. In 1982, Amichai received the Israel Prize for Poetry, and he became a foreign honorary member of the American Academy of Arts and Letters in 1986. He lived in Jerusalem until his death on September 25, 2000.


“I, for one, return to his poetry again and again, and always find myself shaken, as by something truly genuine and alive.”—Ted Hughes

“Amichai has entered that small, accidental, permanent company of poets—Hikmet, Milosz, Vallejo—who speak for each of us and all of us by redefining our nobility, by speaking to us in his voice of many selves.”—Stephen Berg

“He is one of our great poets...Once one has heard his quiet, even tones, precise, distanced and passionate, one can never forget them.”—The Times Literary Supplement