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Leonard Cohen in the Sinai
by Matti Friedman
The little-known story of Leonard Cohen's concert tour to the front lines of the Yom Kippur War, including never-before-seen selections from an unfinished manuscript by Cohen and rare photographs.
In October 1973, the poet and singer Leonard Cohen—thirty-nine years old, famous, unhappy, and at a creative dead end—traveled from his home on the Greek island of Hydra to the chaos and bloodshed of the Sinai desert when Egypt attacked Israel on the Jewish high holiday of Yom Kippur.
Moving around the front with a guitar and a group of local musicians, Cohen met hundreds of young soldiers, men and women at the worst moment of their lives. Those who survived never forgot the experience. And the war transformed Cohen. He had announced that he was abandoning his music career, but he instead returned to Hydra and to his family, had a second child, and released one of the best albums of his career.
In Who by Fire, journalist Matti Friedman gives us a riveting account of those weeks in the Sinai, drawing on Cohen's previously unpublished writing and original reporting to create a kaleidoscopic depiction of a harrowing, formative moment for both a young country at war and a singer at a crossroads.
"Journalist Friedman illuminates in this fascinating tale an extraordinary chapter in the career of singer and songwriter Leonard Cohen (1934–2016) that left a lasting impact on the state of Israel...This demonstration of the power of song will stun fans of the legendary artist." - Publishers Weekly (starred review)
"[C]ompelling...An engaging historical resurrection, the book also includes rare photos. Cohen fans will savor this little-known footnote in the singer's life." - Kirkus Reviews
"A fascinating and intense account of Leonard Cohen's time in Israel during the 19-day Yom Kippur War of 1973. A must for any Leonard Cohen completist, with excerpts from his unpublished manuscripts from that time. Soulful and thoughtfully done." - Suzanne Vega
"Who By Fire is a stunning resurrection of a moment in the life of Leonard Cohen and the history of Israel. It's the story of a young artist in crisis and a young country at war, and the powerful resonance of the chord struck between them. A beautiful, haunting book." - Nicole Krauss
"A short, symphonic book of remarkable stories of yearning, love, and war, whose leitmotif is a haunted artist bearing secret chords that enchant the world." - Rabbi David Wolpe
This information about Who By Fire was first featured
in "The BookBrowse Review" - BookBrowse's membership magazine, and in our weekly "Publishing This Week" newsletter. Publication information is for the USA, and (unless stated otherwise) represents the first print edition. The reviews are necessarily limited to those that were available to us ahead of publication. If you are the publisher or author and feel that they do not properly reflect the range of media opinion now available, send us a message with the mainstream reviews that you would like to see added.
Any "Author Information" displayed below reflects the author's biography at the time this particular book was published.
Matti Friedman is an award-winning journalist and author. Born in Toronto and based in Jerusalem, he's a frequent contributor to the New York Times Opinion page. Friedman's last book, Spies of No Country: Secret Lives at the Birth of Israel, won the 2019 Natan Prize and the Canadian Jewish Book Award for history. Pumpkinflowers: A Soldier's Story of a Forgotten War was chosen in 2016 as a New York Times Notable Book and one of Amazon's 10 best books of the year. His first book, The Aleppo Codex, won the 2014 Sami Rohr Prize and the ALA's Sophie Brody Medal.
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