Esther Raab


Esther Raab was a Hebrew author of prose and poetry, known as "the first Sabra poet," due to her eminence as the first Israeli woman poet and for the prominence of her native landscape in her imagery.

Biography

Esther Raab was born and raised in the rural moshava of Petah Tikva in Palestine, to founding residents Judah and Leah Raab. Raab's grandfather was an immigrant from the Hungarian village of Szentistván who moved to Palestine with his son in 1876 and settled in Jerusalem. Raab was the second of four children born to Yehuda and Leah, Yehuda's second wife. In late 1909, the moshava’s school became co-ed, and Raab, aged fifteen, was prohibited by her father from attending. She later wrote that that decision hurt her a lot.
In 1913, she moved to Degania Alef, the earliest kibbutz, with Second Aliyah pioneers. In 1914, she returned to Petah Tikva.
In 1921, Raab visited her cousins, the Green family, in Cairo, Egypt. In December 1921, Raab married her cousin, Yitzhak Green, in Cairo. Raab and Green lived in Hilwan, a suburb of Cairo, for five years following their marriage. She then returned to Palestine and lived in Tel Aviv, where her home became a literary salon. Raab’s first poetry collection, Kimshonim, was published in 1930. The collection is dedicated to Green, who died suddenly the same year. Raab was briefly remarried to artist Arieh Alwei from 1932 to 1935. In 1945, she returned to Petah Tikva. During that time, she studied education and worked in teaching and agriculture.
Raab continued to publish over several decades, often silent for years due to financial and other difficulties. Raab’s second poetry collection, Tefila Achrona, was published in 1964.
Raab died in 1981. A line from her poem Neshoret is written on her tombstone: "The clods of your soil were sweet to me, homeland, as the clouds in your skies."
Two collections of Raab's work were published after her death: Collected Poems in 1988 and Collected Prose in 2001. Both volumes were edited by Raab's nephew, Ehud ben Ezer. Ben Ezer is also the author of her 1998 biography, Yamim shel La'anah u-Devash.

Poetry

Much of Raab's poetry is free verse, with no set rhyme or meter.
The principal theme in Raab's work is nature; she references particular plants and often describes the land of Israel in her works. Much of Raab's poetry also manipulates traditional ideas of sex and gender, challenging a concrete gender binary.

Awards and recognition

  • 1964 – for literature, awarded by the Municipality of Holon for the poetry book The Poems of Esther Raab
  • 1972 – the Hebrew Literary Works">Hebrew language">Hebrew Literary Works

Published works

Books in HebrewThistles , Hedim, 1930 Poetry of Esther Raab, Massada, 1963 Last Prayer , Am Oved, 1972 The Murmur of Roots, HaKibbutz HaMeuhad, 1976 A Destroyed Garden: selected stories and seven poems, Tarmil, 1983
Later Compilations and Editions in Hebrew
  • Esther Raab, An Anthology: selected poems with an introduction, selected edited and introduced by Ehud Ben Ezer and Reuven Shoham, Yachdav and the Hebrew Writers Association, 1982
  • Complete Poetry, Zmora Bitan, 1988 ; a second edition published 1994Complete Prose, Astrolog, 2001
Works in Translation