Rana Werbin

I was born in Tel Aviv in 1973. I started reading when I was about four years old, but most of my life wanted to be an actress and so went to study theater in NY after my army service. When I came back home I started acting and translating plays for the theater, and later went on to study for a BA in comparative and English literature at Tel Aviv University. During my studies I wrote literary criticism for Haaretz newspaper and translated books for Yedioth publishing house. Upon receiving my degree, I started writing a weekly literary column for the “Ha-ir” section of Haaretz, for which I was awarded the Bernstein award for literary criticism in newspapers in 2005. For the last four years I have been the editor in chief of Hebrew literature at Yedioth Books, together with hosting and participating in several TV shows about culture and literature in Israel. I am also about to complete my MA in philosophy, culture and digital media at Tel Aviv University.

I am greatly interested in the move to digital media, and look forward to a time when all of literature would be immediately available to everyone, around the world. I am also curious as to what effect such a move will have on the way we read and write books. Yedioth Books is one of the largest publishing houses in Israel, although it has a relatively small editorial base. Together with our imprints, we publish around 250 books a year, in all areas: literature, fiction and non-fiction, biographies, youth and children, popular science, and so on. We are very well known for our Jewish literature department, and for our political non-fiction department.