Yitzhak Gormezano Goren

Yitzhak Gormezano Goren was born in 1941 in Alexandria

Yitzhak Gormezano Goren was born in Alexandria, Egypt, on December 27, 1941. He came to Israel with his parents in 1951. For 4 years the family lived in the Gil-Am transit camp near Kiryat Ata.

He studied English literature and French culture at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem and Tel Aviv University. From late 1974 to 1980 he lived in New York. There he earned an MFA in theater directing from Brooklyn College.

He edited drama programs at Kol Israel and wrote many radio plays. He was literary manager of the Haifa Theater and taught playwriting and screenwriting at Tel Aviv University. He also wrote scripts for Educational Television.

In 1982 he founded the Kedem Stage Theater with his wife, actress Shosha Goren, and playwright Rafael Aharon, and ran it until 2012. He founded a publishing house in 1998 and the literary journal Hakivun Mizrakh in 2000. His work seeks to strengthen Mizrahi culture within Israeli culture.

His awards include the Prime Minister's Prize for Hebrew writers in 2001 and a lifetime achievement prize from the Ministry of Culture in 2015. He lives in Tel Aviv and in Moshav Kfar Kish.