Survival of the Word: Poetry for International Holocaust Remembrance Day

Many of us have heard of Paul Celan and his haunting poem of the Holocaust, “Death Fugue”: “Black milk of daybreak, we drink you at night…” In preparation for International Holocaust Remembrance Day, we’ll learn about some of Celan’s contemporaries: Nelly Sachs, Bertolt Brecht, Dan Paris, Abba Kovner, Primo Levi, Ida Fink, Abraham Sutzkever and many more, who wrote about one of the darkest moments in history. We will explore a bit about these poets’ biographies, how they survived the Holocaust, where they settled, the languages they wrote in, and sample their powerful poetry.

Rachel Neve-Midbar is a poet and essayist. Her first full-length poetry collection, Salaam of Birds, was chosen by Dorothy Barresi for the Patricia Bibby First Book Prize and was published by Tebot Bach in January 2020. She is also the author of the 2014 chapbook, What the Light Reveals. Her work has appeared in many journals and anthologies. A current Ph.D. candidate at the University of Southern California, Rachel is also editor of Stained: An Anthology of Writing about Menstruation for the AuntFlo2020 Project. More at rachelnevemidbar.com.

The session will be recorded and sent to participants. We encourage live attendance for you to get the most out of the experience.

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