New Selected Poems, 1957-2005
Tuvia Ruebner is one of the leading Israeli poets of the generation that began writing in the 1950s. His poetry addresses the great subjects of modern Jewish history – World War II and the destruction of European Jewry. The experience of family loss gives his poems a very personal perspective and insights that are also universal. The reality that is implied, chaotic and disjointed as it may be, is reassembled and restored in his poems by the hand of a craftsman, with restraint, economy and polish.
Ruebner`s poetry has two main roots – Europe and Israel; one of the salient elements of his work is memory, which brings the past into the present. He thus also deals with the varied aspects of time, out of a sharp awareness of its transience. However, the presence of death does not negate his passion for beauty, his search for it and his acknowledgement of its existence, even in a world that is cruel.
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“ Ruebner`s poetry is polished and intellectual, influenced by the ancient layers of Hebrew culture as well as by the European culture that he imbibed in his childhood and youth. This is enthralling poetry, and the changes that it has undergone attest to its strength and its ongoing vitality.”
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“ An extraordinary book.”
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“ Ruebner`s language now has an unusual lightness... which reflects above all great linguistic mastery.”
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“ What, in Ruebner`s poetry, becomes language is simultaneously beyond language or its refutation.”