Eternal Present
Poetic Figuration and Cultural Memory in the Poetry of Yehuda Amichai, Dan Pagis, and Tuvia R bner
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 2755331 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Amir Eshel (corresponding author) |
| Year | 2000 |
| Volume | 7 |
| Issue | 1 |
| Pages | 141-166 |
| Publication date | 2000-10-01 |
| Peer Reviewed | Yes |
| Open Access | No |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | Jewish Social Studies (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 0021-6704 • E-ISSN: 1527-2028 |
| Publisher | Indiana University Press (PUBLISHER • US) |
| DOI | 10.2979/jss.2000.7.1.141 |
| OpenAlex | W2041511692 |
| Language | EN |
| Citations received | 1 |
| References cited | 5 |
For Yehuda Amichai's devoted readers, these stanzas look very familiar in their unique combination of the profane and the celestial. Indeed, these verses draw an intriguing line by combining the ostensibly divided realms of the sacrilegious and the sanctified in a single gesture. The resemblance of the two stanzas is further highlighted by the similarity of their rhetorical structure--supposition, elaboration, and simile: "The world is. . ."; "And every person is. . ."; "Like the Flood"; "Like our God." These pointed similes are notably echoed in the repetition of the water metaphoric, both the ancient [End Page 141] symbol of chaos and renewal and the rather modern signifier of the luring unconscious. Amichai's ironic dialectic of memory and oblivion as well as the poem's oscillation between Lethe's charms and Mnemosyne's demanding voice lead finally to the setting of life as a single moment in eternity, a rather insignificant marker for these undividable entities--God, Time--for which there is neither "before" nor "after
Art · Literature · Poetry · Jewish and Middle Eastern Studies
| Unique citing works | 1 |
|---|---|
| Citations per year | 0,05 |
| Citation span | 2004 - 2004 (1) |
| Citation velocity | historical |
| Highly cited | No |