Hava Pinhas-Cohen is a notable Israeli poet, lecturer on
literature and art, facilitator of poetry and prose writing workshops and
editor of poetry books and art books. In 1989, she founded the magazine DIMOOY for Jewish Literature, Art, and Culture, and served as its editor for 22 years.
Hava Pinhas-Cohen is the founder and artistic director of the “Kisufim” Conference of Jewish Writers and Poets, which was held for the fifth time in 2019.
A main topic of Pinhas-Cohen’s research and writing is Jewish literature and the identity of Jewish literature after the Second World War. She has focused particularly on the Ladino culture which flourished for five centuries in various regions of the Balkans after the expulsion of the Jews from Spain, only to disappear almost entirely in the Holocaust. Hava Pinhas-Cohen travels frequently in the Balkans (Bulgaria, Serbia, Macedonia and Slovenia) and writes about the region from both Jewish and general cultural perspectives.
To date, Pinhas-Cohen has had twelve books of Hebrew poetry published by Am Oved and Hakibbutz Hameuchad. With the poet Israel Eliraz, she co-authored A School of One Man, a book of conversations about poetry and art. Her poems have been translated into English, French, German, Dutch, Bulgarian, Spanish, Chinese, Serbo-Croatian, Hungarian, Turkish, Slovenian, Romanian, and Italian, and have appeared in various anthologies in those languages. A bilingual edition of her poems was published by Amphora in Amsterdam in 2009. A selection of her poems, Bridging the Divide, translated by Sharon Hart-Greene, was published by Syracuse University Press in 2016. Orphea’s Poetry was translated into Macedonian by Elizabeta Sheleva and published by Magor in 2017.
A collection of Pinhas-Cohen’s Hebrew translations of American poet Robert Pinsky was published by “Kisufim.” The contemporary Slovenian poetry anthology I Am Burning and Cannot Reach the Silence, translated to Hebrew by Pinhas-Cohen in collaboration with poet Barbara Pogačnik, was published by Hakibbutz Hameuchad in 2016.
Prizes
Among the awards granted to Hava Pinhas-Cohen are the “Hayetsira” Prize, the Alterman Prize, ACUM Prize for the Best Book of the Year, the Kugel Prize of the Municipality of Holon, the Rishon Lezion Prize in the name of Meir Ariel for Hebrew Composition, the Ramat Gan Prize, and others. She received the Pro Poet Festival Prize in Indija Serbia, 2018 and the Best Lyrics Award at the Azem Shkreli Poetry Festival in Kosovo, 2019. Prize ON THE TRAIL OF ORPHEUS, International Festival of Poetry ORPHEUS, Bulgaria Plovdiv, 2020.
Publications
Poetry: (Hebrew)
And Half My Lust in His Hand, Hakibbutz Hameuchad, 2018.
Unique Journey, Keshev, 2015.
Gathered to be Present: A Dialogue with the Images of Yaakov Sharir (bilingual), 2015.
My Brother, the Thirst, Hakibbutz Hameuchad. 2012.
Shviit, HaKibbutz Hameuchad, 2008.
The Gardner, the Bitch and the Slut, HaKibbutz Hameuchad, 2005.
Messiah, HaKibbutz Hameuchad (Ritmus Series), 2003.
Poems of Orphea, HaKibbutz Hameuchad, 2001.
River and Forgetfulness, HaKibbutz Hameuchad, 1998.
Journey of the Doe, HaKibbutz Hameuchad,1995.
Mostly Color, Am Oved, 1989.
Prose: (Hebrew)
A School of One Man: A Dialogue with Israel Eliraz. Ten conversations about poetry and culture with a senior Israeli poet.
Translations to Hebrew:
A Selection of Robert Pinsky’s Poetry, Mishkenot Shaananim production for Kisufim, 2013.
I Am Burning and Cannot Reach the Silence, Anthology of Slovenian Contemporary Poetry in Hebrew, edited and translated by Hava Pinhas-Cohen and Barbara Pogačnik, 2016.
Journals:
Editor and founder of: DIMOOY: A Journal of Literature Arts, and Jewish Culture, since 1989.
Art Books:
Andy Aronovitz, A Prayer of a Mother before Dawn, art book by Andy Aronovitz with the poem “A Prayer of a Mother before Dawn,” 2015.
Matty Grunberg, The Gardener, the Bitch and the Slut, art book by Matty Grunberg with erotic poems by Hava Pinhas-Cohen.
Translations into other languages:
Door het vlees stroomt het verlangen, Dutch, Translated by Yael Moshe and published by Amphora Publishing House.
Bridging the Divide, translated by Sharon Hart Green, Syracuse University Press, 2015.
Pesmie na Orpheaja, translated into Macedonian by Elizabeta Sheleva, Skopje: Magor, 2015.
