Aharon Amir

Aharon Amir ( _he. אהרן אמיר, January 5, 1923 in Kaunas,Lithuania - February 28, 2008 in Tzrifin) was an Israeli Hebrew poet, translator and writer.

Biography

Amir was born in Kaunas,Lithuania. He moved to Palestine with his family in 1933 and grew up in Tel Aviv. His father,Meir Lipec, was later director of the publishing house "Am Oved".He attended Gymnasia Herzliya high school. At the time of the British Mandate in Palestine, while studying Arabic Language and Literature at the Hebrew University, Amir was a member of the Irgun and Lehi undergrounds as well as a founding member of the Canaanite movementCite news
volume = 5
last = Laor
first = Dan
title = American Literature and Israeli Culture: The Case of the Canaanites
work = Questia
accessdate = 2007-12-22
date = 2000
url = http://www.questia.com/googleScholar.qst;jsessionid=HtJDLhFQqKT9nm9JB2tvSvLSlP747wv35CFpBjyJsy3M2GKknpKg!-338391498?docId=98497215] , which saw Hebrew or Israeli culture as defined by geographical location rather than religious affiliation. Amir was married to Bettine, a poet and painter. He had three children from a previous marriage.

He died of cancer on February 28, 2008, at the age of 85, and left his body to science.Cite news
last = Lev-Ari
first = Shiri
title = Tribute to a Hebrew man
work = Haaretz
accessdate = 2008-04-14
date = 2008-03-13
url = http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/961711.html]

Literary career

Amir translated over 300 books into Hebrew, including English and French classics by Melville, Charles Dickens, Churchill, Camus, Lewis Carroll, Joseph Conrad and Virginia Woolf, Edgar Allan Poe, Ernest Hemingway, John Steinbeck, Emily Bronte and O. Henry. He also translated works by Winston Churchill and Charles de Gaulle. He founded and edited the literary magazine "Keshet", which he closed in 1976 after eighteen years of publication to concentrate on his own writingCite web
title = Aharon Amir
work = The Institute for the Translation of Hebrew Literature
accessdate = 2007-12-22
url = http://www.ithl.org.il/author_info.asp?id=15] . In 1998, the magazine was revived as "The New Keshet".

Amir won the Tchernichovsky Prize for translation in 1951 and the Israel Prize in 2003. He was often known in Israel thanks to a popular song by Meir Ariel, which cited Amir's translation of Hemigway's Islands in the Stream.

Publications

Books Published in Hebrew

* "Qadim" (poetry), Machbarot Lesifrut, 1949 [Qadim]
* "Love" (stories), Machbarot Lesifrut, 1951 [Ahava]
* "And Death Shall Have No Dominion" (novel), Zohar, 1955 [Ve-Lo Tehi La-Mavet Memshala]
* "Seraph" (poetry), Machbarot Lesifrut, 1956 [Saraph]
* "Nun" (trilogy), Massada, 1969-1989 [Nun]
* "Yated" (poetry), Levin-Epstein, 1970 [Yated]
* "Prose" (stories), Hadar, 1972 [Proza]
* "A Perfect World" (novel), Massada, 1975 [Olam She-Kullo Tov]
* "A Separate Peace" (poetry), Massada, 1979 [Shalom Nifrad]
* "Aphrodite or the Organized Tour" (novella), Ma'ariv, 1984 [Afroditi o Ha-Tiyul Ha-Meurgan]
* "Heres" (poetry), Zmora Bitan, 1984 [Heres]
* "The Clouds Return After the Rain" (poetry), Bialik Institute/Machbarot Lesifrut, 1991 [Ve-Shavu He-Avim Ahar Ha-Geshem]
* "Aaron's Rod" (poetry), Zmora Bitan, 1996 [Mate Aharon]
* "The Villains" (novel), 1998 [Ha-Nevalim]

Books in Translation

* And Death Shall Have No Dominion(Le soldats du matin); French: Paris, Le Seuil, 1961

References

External links

* Cite news
last = Amir
first = Aharon
title = One of the chosen
work = Haaretz
accessdate = 2007-12-22
date = 2004-02-20
url = http://cache.zoominfo.com/CachedPage/?archive_id=0&page_id=608528859&page_url=%2f%2fwww.haaretz.com%2fhasen%2fspages%2f396335.html&page_last_updated=2%2f19%2f2004+9%3a49%3a15+PM&firstName=Aharon&lastName=Amir
* Cite news
volume = 6
last = Amir
first = Aharon
title = The Jewish State: The Next Fifty Years
work = Azure
accessdate = 2007-12-22
date = 1999
url = http://www.azure.org.il/magazine/magazine.asp?id=93