אביבה-לא

by Shimon Adaf, שמעון אדף, Yael Segalovitz (Contributor)

בספר השירים השלישי שלו "אביבה-לא" שמעון אדף מתאבל על אחותו אביבה וכואב את אובדנה לפני כשנתיים בהיותה בת 43. קדמו לו המונולוג של איקרוס (גוונים, 1997) ומה שחשבתי צל הוא הגוף האמיתי (כתר, 2002); כמו כן ראו אור רומן בלשי אחד, קילומטר ויומיים לפני השקיעה (כתר, 2004), ספר הפנטזיה הלב הקבור (אחוזת בית, 2006) והרומן פנים צרובי חמה (עם עובד, 2008).

שלושה שערים לספר: דבר, 1; שירה, 2; עזב, 3; ובהם מ"ג שירים, שמותיהם אותיות.

Genres: Poetry

71 pages, Unknown Binding

First published January 1, 2009

About the author

Shimon Adaf (Hebrew: שמעון אדף) is one of the most vibrant, restless and stirring voices in contemporary Hebrew literature (both prose-fiction and poetry). He has so far written three poetry collections and eight books of prose fiction. For his first book of poems, Icarus' Monologue (1997), Adaf won the Israeli Ministry of Education Prize and parts of it have been included in the Israeli high school literature curriculum. For his fifth novel, Mox Nox (2011), Adaf won the prestigious Israeli Sapir Prize (2013) and his third novel, Sunburned Faces (2008), published in English by PS press (2013), appeared on The Guardian’s list of the best science fiction for 2013, alongside Stephen King and Margaret Atwood. He is currently the chair of the creative writing program at Ben Gurion University in Israel.

Reviews

[S P · Rating 3 out of 5]

Aviva-No begins as an elegy for Shimon Adaf's deceased sister, Aviva: a name which means spring in Hebrew. These deeply tender and personal poems find grief as a "presence without end, a fleet of wounds / nearing the annulment of all limits". Most poems draw upon a mixture of prayers, Jewish mourning rituals and esoteric religious references in order to give language to the bodies of those who have departed as well as those left behind. Adaf attempts to break down the language of loss and remould it into something naturally regenerative; yet some of the wordplay, the dissonant registers and rhyme, do not entirely work in English. The cycle ends in the city of Sderot, near Gaza, having moved from the personal into a more political vision. This third, final section, with its almost theatrical depictions of collapse, feels dense and chaotic. Towards the end, a two-page spread of pitch-black squares, in lieu of any words, seems to affirm Adaf's realisation that language will always fail to adequately represent what he wishes to get across.