Naomi ventured into writing from the imagination after a fullness of years studying analytic philosophy (A.B., University of Pennsylvania) and literature of the past (M.A., University of Illinois and Ph.D., New York University). The activity that saved her soul during these times was playing the violin in chamber ensembles.
She joined the Women’s Studies Research Center at Brandeis University in 1991 as a poet writing feminist interpretation of the Hebrew Bible. Her extended biblical monologues marked a transition to writing fiction and writing increasingly on themes relating to Jewishness and Judaism.
Naomi acknowledges gratefully the education in Hebrew language she was granted in sixth through eighth grades at the Akiba Hebrew Academy with full scholarship, as well as scholarships to study violin at the Settlement Music School, both in Philadelphia. Access to texts in Hebrew and to classical music have enriched her life enormously.
Other important enrichments include the companionship of Hugo “The Fuzzer” Baron de Lyonne, striped cat of hearty appetite, indolent disposition, and affinity for sites of classical music. The ecstasy and challenges of mothering an infant. Great places in the natural world: hiking in Iceland, the Canadian Rockies, the Sierra Nevada, Tuscany and Umbria. Closer to home, restorative walking in local woods in and near Newton, Massachusetts. Restoration of the soul in the compelling, tranquil beauty of the hilltowns of Western Massachusetts and up-island on Martha’s Vineyard.
And, yes, the joy of Food and the challenges of Truth.
