JWA talks to poet Marge Piercy about her latest book, self-care, and fighting for causes you believe in. 

Writing in German, Yiddish, and Hebrew, these four Jewish women poets, transformed language, identity, and poetry itself—yet their names remain overlooked in literary history.

Blanche Bendahan, born in Algeria in 1893, to a Sephardi father and a Catholic mother, became a renowned writer, poet, and political activist. One of her most famous works,Mazaltob, addressed themes of tradition versus modernity, women's rights, and the intersections between Jewish, Muslim, and Christian communities. She continued to write about her homeland until her death in 1975, combining her multicultural background with modernist style.

Barbara Ostfeld became the first ordained female cantor at age 22, serving a number of temples in her tenure. Ostfeld was passionate about music from a young age and finds joy in her work through poetry and musical theory alike. She is also a writer; her essays on feminism and cantorial work have been printed in several publications. 

JWA talks to poet Aurora Levins Morales about her new book of poetry, Rimonim: Ritual Poetry of Jewish Liberation, and considers the power of protest, prophecy, and music in these times that call us to action.

JWA chats with poet and activist Joy Ladin about her two new books, gender transformations, and resisting tyranny.

Religion and art are both about turning individual experiences into community ones.

Friḥa Ben Adiba (c. 1730-1756) is the sole woman Hebrew poet from North Africa, who wrote Hebrew liturgical and messianic poems in the way of hundreds of rabbinic poets. She was born and grew up in Morocco but around 1750 arrived with her family in Tunis, where she died a few years later as a martyr in a pogrom. After her death she became a saintly figure for the Tunisian Jews. 

Elana Dykewomon was a poet, novelist, editor, theorist, lesbian, and cultural worker. Her lesbian and Jewish identities and commitments informed and shaped her award-winning novels and other writings, and she made significant theoretical contributions to lesbian separatism and fat liberation.

JWA talks to Mildred Faintly about her recently published translation of Else Lasker-Schüler's book of poetry,Styx.

The Mexican Ashkenazi poet Gloria Gervitz (1943–2022) is known for her award-winning, book-length poemMigrations (Migraciones). This poem, an epic journey through the individual and collective memories of Ashkenazi women emigrants to Mexico, which she began writing in 1976, took her 44 years to complete. In 2018, Gervitz won the prestigious Pablo Neruda Ibero-American Poetry Award forMigraciones.

Out of her personal suffering and poetic genius, Julia Vinograd created an iconic image of Jerusalem that is powerful, feminist, and unforgettably, startlingly modern.

Julia Vinograd was a street poet and the author of 68 slender volumes of verse widely admired for their vivid portraits of bohemians and street people in twentieth-century Berkeley, California. Her writing, which evolved in café open mic readings, is notable for its oratorical clarity, emotional warmth, and surreal imagination. 

JWA chats with Jessica Jacobs, poet and founder and executive director of the organization Yetzirah: A Home for Jewish Poetry. 

The year 2023 brought the deaths of several powerful and influential Jewish women, whose insights and voices changed the world and are all the more painful to lose in this difficult time. 

JWA chats with poet and rabbi Mónica Gomery about her newest poetry collection,Might Kindred. 

Judith Rosenbaum interviewed Jean Trounstine on July 21, 2000, in Lowell, Massachusetts for the Women Who Dared Oral History Project. Trounstine details her Jewish background in Cincinnati, how it shaped her political lens, and her prison reform work, including theater productions with incarcerated women.

JWA talks to playwright Anna Ziegler. 

Sandra Stillman Gartner and Ann Buffum interviewed Judith Chalmer in Winooski, Vermont, on November 3 and December 8, 2005, as part of DAVAR’s oral history project. Chalmer discusses her family's history, her creative path as a writer, and her reflections on her Jewish identity and the role of women in Judaism, inspired by her father's experiences during the Holocaust and her efforts to honor those who helped her family.

Judith Rosenbaum interviewed Merle Feld on July 19, 2000, in Northampton, Massachusetts, as part of the Women Who Dared Oral History Project. Feld recounts her upbringing in Brooklyn, her involvement in the Jewish community, her work in facilitating Israeli-Palestinian dialogue, and the profound impact of her activism on her life and career as a writer and public figure.

JWA talks with Stella Levy about her appearance in an iconic photo from the 1960s, and how things have changed for women in the literary world since then. 

I refuse to choose between being a “good woman”ora woman who will not be intimidated, belittled, or silenced.

Author and poet Roya Hakakian was born in Tehran in 1966 and fled Iran with her family in 1985, seeking asylum in the United States. Hakakian is the author of two collections of Persian poetry, an acclaimed memoir, and essays on Iranian issues.

Lesbian feminist writer Lesléa Newman made history in 1989 with her controversial children’s book,Heather Has Two Mommies. Inspired by Newman’s friend, a lesbian mother who complained that there were no children’s books with families that looked like hers, the book sparked national controversy. Newman has written countless books for children, adolescents, and adults on homosexuality, Jewish identity, eating disorders, and AIDS.