Israeli literature

Israeli literature is literature written in the State of Israel by Israelis. Most works classed as Israeli literature are written in the Hebrew language, although some Israeli authors write in Yiddish, English, Arabic and Russian.

The foundations of modern Israel writing were laid by a group of literary pioneers from the Second Aliyah including S.Y. Agnon, Moshe Smilansky, Yosef Haim Brenner, David Shimoni and Jacob Fichman. Until World War I, Hebrew literature was centered in Eastern Europe. After the war and the Russian Revolution many Hebrew writers found their way to Palestine, so that at the time Palestinian writing was essentially a continuation of the European tradition. In 1921, 70 writers met in Tel Aviv and founded the Hebrew Writers' Association. About this time the first literary periodicals made their appearance—Ha-Adamah, edited by Brenner, and Ma'abarot, edited by Fichman. The 1920 and 1930s witnessed the emergence of Palestine as the dominant center of Hebrew literary activity. Many of the pioneers of Hebrew literature were Zionists, and eventually made their way to Palestine. The great figures of the early part of the century—Bialik, Ahad Ha-Am, Tchernichovsky—all spent their last years in Tel Aviv, and although this was not the period of their greatest creativity, they exerted a great influence on younger Hebrew writers.

Among the earliest modern Hebrew writers was a small minority of writers who were born in Palestine. This cadre includes Yitzhaq Shami and Yehuda Burla , Sepharadi Jews whose families migrated to Palestine in the 19th and 18th centuries, respectively. The writing of this group stands out for its authentic depiction of the Arab and Jewish population of Palestine, told from the vantage point of those who grew up in its midst.

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