Lena Dunham Connected To Judaism Through Israeli Poet Yehuda Amichai
Image by Getty Images
(JTA) — Jewish actress, writer and director Lena Dunham announced to her 3.2 million followers on Instagram that she has connected to Judaism through the poetry of modern Israeli poet Yehuda Amichai.
In a post on erev Yom Kippur, Dunham wrote: “This past year a special person helped me connect to my Judaism in a new way, beyond bagels and sample sales and crushing guilt.”
She said that after the death of her grandmother she “suddenly felt a desire to understand what the religion that meant so much to her had to offer her granddaughter, even if my world view is far less cleanly structured than hers.”
“While I’ve learned a lot, I haven’t started going to temple. I haven’t married a lawyer. But I have fallen in love with the poetry of Yehuda Amichai and I am sorry to anyone I wronged this year (except for some people on Twitter.)
She included the image of two pages in a book with the Amichai poem “People Use Each Other” in English and in Hebrew.
The post received nearly 29,000 likes and comments ranging from Shanah Tova, to expressions of love for the actress, to recommendations of other poets.
A message from our CEO & publisher Rachel Fishman Feddersen
I hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, I’d like to ask you to please support the Forward’s award-winning, nonprofit journalism during this critical time.
At a time when other newsrooms are closing or cutting back, the Forward has removed its paywall and invested additional resources to report on the ground from Israel and around the U.S. on the impact of the war, rising antisemitism and polarized discourse..
Readers like you make it all possible. Support our work by becoming a Forward Member and connect with our journalism and your community.
— Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO
