Lior Maayan
Current City, State, Country
Birth City, State, Country
Biography
Lior Maayan was born in Tel-Aviv Israel to a family with over 200 years in Jerusalem. He studied Physics and Mathematics at the Hebrew University, earned an MSc. in Behavioral Sciences at the Technion, and MBA at INSEAD-France. During his hi-tech executive tenure he served as KLA-Orbotech CVP of Business Development and prior to that as OrSense CEO and Compugen COO. He is a member of the first Helicon Hebrew-Arabic poetry program and lately part of the Poetry Place Arabic-Hebrew translation group. A 2023-24 ALMA-Metanel Fellow. He is the first winner of the Weizmann Institute Poetry Award and the 2023 laureate of CLIL EcoPoetics Prize. His work appeared in Granta, Asymptote, Yediot Aharonot, IHRAM, Meshiv Haruach, JBC Paper Brigade Daily, and WriteHaus among others. His debut book That Green (edited by Shira Stav, Afik, 2019) was shortlisted on Haaretz. His second book What is Now was winner of the Clil Prize and the Rabinovich Foundation fund, and is due to be published by Afik in 2023.
What is the relationship between Judaism and/or Jewish culture and your poetry?
I was born in Israel to a family that arrived to Zefat in 1806 and settled in Jerusalem for 7 generations. My orthodox grandfather was the first to teach me the Alef-Beit when I was four and made sure I will practice Judaism which I did until the age of 18 when I left for the Army. Occasionally, a man is born into a language and that is how I feel towards Hebrew—it is my place of living not only my way of thinking and communicating with the world. And such is my poetry—a poetry of a place which is both my family, community, state and Hebrew. As part of several communities of artists (ALMA fellow, Schoken Institute) which looks at Jewish culture as the origin of our Yetzirah, I’m constantly studying Jewish writings and try to communicate with it.
Published Works
Poetry
What is Now (Hebrew, Afik Publishing, 2023)
That Green; edited by Shira Stav (Hebrew, Afik Publishing, 2019)
Links to Sample Works
Video Reading
Current Title
Education
Technion, Israel, MSc in Behavioral Sciences
INSEAD, France, MBA
Hebrew University: Talpiot program, BSc in Physics and Mathematics