About the Poet

Yehuda Amichai is one of the leading literary figures in Israel and a poet of international reputation. He has published eleven volumes of poetry in Hebrew; two novels, including Not of This Time, Not of This Place; and a book of short stories, The World Is a Room. His work has been translated into thirty-three languages. His collections of poetry in English translation include Poems, Songs of Jerusalem and Myself, Amen, Time, Love Poems, A Great Tranquillity: Questions and Answers, Poems of Jerusalem, Even a Fist Was Once an Open Palm with Fingers, and Yehuda Amichai: A Life of Poetry, 1948-1994. He lives in Jerusalem with his wife, Hana Sokolov Amichai. He has two sons, Ron and David, and a daughter, Emmanuella.

About the Translators

Chana Bloch’s books include two collections of poems, The Secrets of the Tribe and The Past Keeps Changing; a critical study, Spelling the Word: George Herbert and the Bible; and, in collaboration with Ariel Bloch, translations of A Dress of Fire and The Window: New and Selected Poems by Dahlia Ravikovitch, and The Song of Songs. She lives in Berkeley, and is Professor of English and Director of the Creative Writing Program at Mills College.

Stephen Mitchell’s books include The Selected Poetry of Rainer Maria Rilke, The Book of Job, Tao Te Ching, The Enlightened Heart, Parables and Portraits, The Enlightened Mind, The Gospel According to Jesus, A Book of Psalms, and the forthcoming Genesis: A New Translation of the Classical Biblical Stories. He lives with his wife, Vicki Chang, an acupuncturist, herbalist, and healer, in northern California.