Part talk, part workshop, in this class we'll explore tkhines, the Yiddish literary genre of devotional prayers often written for, and occasional written by, Jewish Ashkenazi women from the sixteenth through nineteenth century. We will examine historical examples of tkhines, look at some contemporary creative approaches, and then try our hand at poetic practices for finding verse and voice though these texts. 

Dalia Wolfson is a doctoral candidate in Comparative Literature at Harvard University. She is managing editor of Texts & Translations for the Yiddish Studies journal In geveb. Her work has been published in Asymptote, Scrawl Place, Lehrhaus and JewishFiction.net, among others.