Chapters in this book

1. Frontmatter i
2. Contents ix
3. List of Figures xi
4. Note on Hebrew Transliteration xiii
5. Prologue “Why Jerusalem?” The Politics of Poetry 1
6. 1 Introduction “This House, which is called by My Name” 12
7. Part I Literary Archaeologies
8. 1 “Yes, you did laugh!”: The Secret of the Akeda 29
9. 2 “You are as majestic as Jerusalem”: The Song and the City 57
10. 3 “Apples of gold in ornaments of silver”: Maimonides’s Guide to the Poetic Imagination 89
11. Part II Agnon’s Dilemma
12. 4 “What may this be likened to?”: Agnon and the Poetics of Space 115
13. 5 “Every day I have regretted not having stood in the breach”: Agnon in Jerusalem 138
14. Part III Amichai in the Breach
15. 6 “He comes out of a swimming pool or the sea . . . and he laughs and blesses”: Yehuda Amichai, Poet of the Sacred Quotidian 177
16. 7 “Visit my tears and the east wind, which is the true Western Wall”: Amichai in Jerusalem 192
17. Coda 214
18. Acknowledgments: Ancient Debts and Ongoing Gratitude 225
19. Notes 233
20. Bibliography 295
21. Index of Names 315
22. Index of Biblical Citations 323