The Fall of a Sparrow: The Life and Times of Abba Kovner, Dina Porat (Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 2010), xxiv + 411 pp., cloth $65.00
Journal: Holocaust and Genocide Studies
Year: 2011

Dina Porat succeeds admirably in presenting a positive yet critical narrative of Abba Kovner's life and the events that shaped his personality, art, and political views. The book is organized into four parts corresponding to specific periods in Kovner's eventful life. The first period (1918–41) covers his childhood and youth; the second (1941–44), his pivotal role in the Vilna ghetto underground and subsequent leadership of the United Partisan Organization (known by its Yiddish acronym, FPO); th