EBREI IN TERRA D'ISRAELE
di Yehuda Amichai
 

 

Noi scordiamo donde siamo venuti. I nostri nomi
ebraici dell’esilio ci rivelano,
ricordano il fiore e il frutto, e città medievali,
metalli, cavalieri diventati pietra, e rose in abbondanza,
profumi svaporati, gemme, molto rosso,
lavori manuali che non sono più al mondo.
(E neanche le mani.)

Il taglio del prepuzio ci confonde, come dice la Bibbia
nel racconto di Sichèm e dei figli di Giacobbe:
un dolore che dura finché viviamo.

Che facciamo, tornando in questo luogo con quel dolore.
Le nostalgie sono state prosciugate con le paludi,
il deserto rifiorisce per noi, abbiamo figli leggiadri.
Anche i relitti delle navi naufragate in viaggio
giungano a questa costa,
anche i venti vi giungono. Ma non tutte le vele.

Che facciamo
in quest’oscura terra che getta
ombre gialle che tagliano gli occhi
(succede che qualcuno ancora dica
dopo quaranta o cinquant’anni: “questo sole mi uccide”).

Che facciamo delle anime di nebbia, dei nomi,
degli occhi di selva, dei nostri figli leggiadri,
del nostro rapido sangue?

Il sangue sparso non è radici,
ma è la cosa più vicina alle radici
che abbiano gli uomini.

[da Poesie, Crocetti Editore, 2001]

 
 

Yehuda Amichai è senza dubbio uno dei poeti israeliani più importanti e conosciuti del secolo appena passato; non a caso prima della raccolta di poesie, da cui abbiamo tratto la nostra, edita per Crocetti, le uniche sue opera tradotte da noi erano numerosi capoversi e citazioni comparsi in romanzi di Oz, Grossman e Yeoshua.
Si tratta di un poeta conteso e diviso, uno di quegli scrittori della generazione di chi l’ebraico l’ha imparato invece che appreso. La sua non è una poesia sospesa però, è invece concreta, forte, incredibilmente terrena e tangibile. Sospeso è invece il poeta, come la sua generazione, tra Europa e Israele, tra passato e presente.
Dalla sua opera poetica, forse solo come in quelle di giganti della prosa come Tammuz e Yeoshua, riesce a delinearsi in modo chiaro la straordinaria ed unica complessità che è propria dello stato di Israele. Stato che a causa dei suoi carri armati e dei suoi soldati appare a noi occidentali molto più compatto, forte e sicuro di sé di quanto invece in realtà non sia.

Yehuda Amichai
(1924-2000)

Yehuda Amichai is one of the leading contemporary Hebrew poets. His contribution extends beyond his own literary achievements to an influence that helped create a modern Israeli poetry.
Yehuda Amichai was born to a religiously observant family in Wurzburg, Germany, in 1924 and emigrated with his family to Palestine in to Eretz Yisrael in 1935, living briefly in Petach Tikvah before settling in Jerusalem. He later became a naturalized Israeli citizen. Although German was his native language, Amichai read Hebrew fluently by the time he moved to Palestine. He served in the Jewish Brigade of the British Army in World War II and fought with the Israeli defense forces in the 1948 Arab-Israeli war. Following the war, he attended Hebrew University to study Biblical texts and Hebrew literature, and then taught in secondary schools.

Amichai's first volume of poetry, Achshav Uve-Yamim HaAharim (“Now and in Other Days”) was published in 1955 and aroused serious interest in readers and critics alike. This and subsequent volumes of poetry revealed that Amichai was engaged in a distinctly modern literary enterprise, both in content and in language. Subjects heretofore deemed prosaic became appropriate poetic images: tanks, airplanes, fuel, administrative contracts, and technological terms figure in his work, reflecting Amichai's conviction that a modern poetry must confront and reflect contemporary issues.
Concomitant with his non-traditional choice of subjects is Amichai's innovative use of the Hebrew language. Drawing from and interfacing various strata of language, from classical Hebrew to the post-modern colloquial, Amichai became known as the “poet who plays with words.” Influenced by the wit and irony of modern English poetry, Amichai, also a master of understatement, coined new idioms and slang expressions, and incorporated prose phrases in his work. As with his imagery and subject matter, his linguistic versatility reflects his sense that language, including poetic language, emerges out of the modern technological society rather than classical texts only. Hence the citation of the Israel Prize, awarded to Amichai in 1982, which heralded “the revolutionary change in poetry's language” that the poet had begun through his work.
Amichai's poetry spans a range of emotions, from laughter to sadness to self-mockery. His work emphasizes the individual who, although conscious and integrally part of the collective experience, ultimately views the world through his personal lens. This individual perspective evinces a candid, honest approach to the outside world.
Amichai's canon is also impressive for the volume of work it encompasses, and many individual books of poetry appeared in rapid succession, as well as Collected Poems (1963) and Selected Works of 1981. Shirei Yerushalayim (“Poems of Jerusalem,” 1987) is a bilingual edition accompanied by photographs of the city, a model Amichai used again in 1992 for other poems, scenes, and photos. In addition to his numerous volumes of poetry, he has written short stories, two novels, radio sketches, and children's literature. Much of his work has been translated into other languages.

Amichai has published eleven volumes of poetry in Hebrew, two novels, and a book of short stories. His work has been translated into thirty-seven languages. His collections of poetry available in English include Open Closed Open (Harcourt Brace, 2000); The Selected Poetry of Yehuda Amichai: Newly Revised and Expanded Edition (1996); A Life of Poetry, 1948-1994 (1995); Even a Fist Was Once an Open Palm with Fingers (1989); Poems of Jerusalem (1988); The Great Tranquility: Questions and Answers (1983); Love Poems (1981); Time (1979); Amen (1977); Songs of Jerusalem and Myself (1973); and Poems (1969). 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.

A Selected Bibliography

Poetry in Translation

Selected Poems (1968) Tr. Assia Gutman
Selected Poems of Yehuda Amichai (1971) Tr. Assia Gutman, Harold Schimmel, and Ted Hughes
Songs of Jerusalem and Myself (1973) Tr. Harold Schimmel
Travels of the Last Benjamin of Tudela (1976) Tr. Ruth Nevo
Amen (1977) Tr. Yehuda Amichai and Ted Hughes
Time (1979)
On New Year's Day, Next to a House Being Built (1979)
Love Poems (1981) Tr. Glenda Abramson and Tudor Parfitt
Travels (1986) Bilingual edition, tr. Ruth Nevo
The Selected Poetry of Yehuda Amichai (1986) Tr. Chana Bloch and Stephen Mitchell
The Early Books of Yehuda Amichai (1988) Tr. Harold Schimmel, Ted Hughes, and Assia Gutman
Poems of Jerusalem: A Bilingual Edition (1988)
Even a Fist Was Once an Open Palm with Fingers: Recent Poems (1991) Tr. Barbara and Benjamin Harshav
I Am Sitting Here Now (1994)
Poems: English and Hebrew (1994)
A Life of Poetry 1948-1994 (1995) Tr. Benjamin and Barbara Harshov
The Great Tranquility: Questions and Answers (1997) Tr. Glenda Abramson and Tudor Parfitt
Exile at Home (1998) Photographs by Frederic Brenner
Open Closed Open: Poems (2000) Tr. Chana Bloch and Chana Kronfeld


Fiction

Not of This Time, Not of This Place (1963)
The World Is a Room and Other Stories (1984)


vedi anche Poems by Yehuda Amichai