Dan Pagis

Dan Pagis' poem at the Konzentrationslager Belzec victims memorial

Dan Pagis (born on October 16, 1930 – died on July 29, 1986) was an Israeli poet, lecturer and holocaust survivor.^[1][2] He was born in Rădăuţi, Bukovina in Romania and imprisoned as a child in a concentration camp in Ukraine. He escaped in 1944 and in 1946 arrived safely in Israel where he became a schoolteacher in a kibbutz.

He earned his PhD from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem where he later taught Medieval Hebrew literature.^[3] His first published book of poetry was Sheon ha-Tsel ("The Shadow Clock") in 1959. In 1970 he published a major work entitled Gilgul – which may be translated as "Revolution, cycle, transformation, metamorphosis, metempsychosis," etc. Other poems include: "Written in Pencil in the Sealed Railway-Car," "Testimony, "Europe, Late," "Autobiography," and "Draft of a Reparations Agreement." Pagis knew many languages, and translated multiple works of literature.

He died in Israel on July 29, 1986, after a battle with cancer.

Pagis' most widely-cited poem is :

written in pencil in the sealed railway car

here in this carload
I am eve
with abel my son
if you see my older son
cain son of adam
tell him that I

Books

Books Published in Hebrew

Poetry

• The Shadow Dial[Sifriat Poalim, 1959 [Shaon Ha-Hol,
• Late Leisure[Sifriat Poalim, 1964 [Sheut Meuheret,
• Transformation[Massada/Hebrew Writers Association, 1970 [Gilgul,
• Brain[Hakibbutz Hameuchad, 1975 [Moah,
• Double Exposure[Hakibbutz Hameuchad, 1982 [Milim Nirdafot,
• Twelve Faces[Hakibbutz Hameuchad, 1984 [Shneim Asar Panim,
• Last Poems[Hakibbutz Hameuchad, 1987 [Shirim Aharonim,
• Collected Poems[Hakibbutz Hameuchad/Bialik Institute, 1991 [Col Ha-Shirim,

Books for Children

• The Egg That Disguised Itself[Am Oved, 1973; 1994 [Ha-Beitzah She-Hithapsah,

Non-Fiction

• The Poems of Levi Ibn Al-Tabban[Israel Academy of Sciences and Humanities, 1968 [Shirei Levi Ibn Alatabban,
• Secular Poetry and Poetic Theory: Moses Ibn-Ezra and his Contemporaries[Bialik Institute, 1970 [Shirat Ha-Hol Ve-Torat Ha-Shir Le-Moshe Eben Ezra U-Vnei Doro,
• Change and Tradition in Secular Poetry: Spain and ItalyKeter, 1976,
• The Scarlet Thread – Hebrew Love Poems from Spain, Italy, Turkey and the Yemen [edited by Dan Pagis), Hakibbutz Hameuchad, 1979 [Ke-Hut Ha-Shani)
• A Secret Sealed[Magnes- Hebrew University, 1986 [Al Sod Hatum,
• Poetry Aptly Explained – Studies and Essays on Medieval Hebrew Poetry [The Magnes Press, Hebrew University, 1993 [Ha-Shir Davur Al Ofanav,

Books in Translation

• Selected Poems, English: Princeton, Quarterly Review of Literature Series, 1992; London, Menard Press, 1972; Philadelphia, Jewish Publication Society, 1981; Berkeley, University of California Press, 1996; San Francisco, North Point, 1989
• German: An beiden Ufern der Zeit, Tr. Anne Birkenhauer, Straelen, Straelener Manuskripte, 2003, ISBN 3-89107-050-0; Erdichteter Mensch, Tr. Tuvia Ruebner, Frankfurt am Main, Suhrkamp, Juedischer Verlag 1993, ISBN 978-3-633-54083-9
• Spanish: Granada, Univ. de Granada, 1994
• The Modern Hebrew Poem Itself (2003), ISBN 0-8143-2485-1
• Variable Directions, Tr. Stephen Mitchell, San Francisco: Northpoint, 1989.
• Poems, Tr. Stephen Mitchell, Oxford: Carcanet Press, 1972.

Further reading

• Karl A. Plank: Eve of the Boxcar. In: Plank: Mother of the Wire Fence. Inside and Outside the Holocaust. Westminster John Knox Press, Louisville, Kentucky, 1994, pp. 42–57. ISBN 0-664-25219-2
• Robert Alter: Dan Pagis and the poetry of displacement, http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m0411/is_n4_v45/ai_19016959

Sources

• HistoryNet
• BiographieNet

References

1. ^ The Holocaust and the war of ideas, Edward Alexander, Transaction Publishers, 1994, pp. 90 ff.
2. ^ Holocaust Literature: An Encyclopedia of Writers and Their Work, S. Lillian Kremer, Taylor & Francis, 2003, pp. 913 ff.
3. ^ Dan Pagis biography & bibliography (The Institute for the Translation of Hebrew Literature)

Persondata
Name	Pagis, Dan
Alternative names
Short description
Date of birth	October 16, 1930
Place of birth
Date of death	July 29, 1986
Place of death