Noa Silver
Noa Silver was born in Jerusalem and raised between Scotland and Maine. After receiving her BA in English and American literature and language from Harvard University, Noa lived and taught English as a Second Language on Namdrik—part of the Republic of the Marshall Islands and the smallest inhabited atoll in the world. She later completed her MFA in creative writing from San Francisco State University and then worked as an editor on various oral history projects, ranging from an archive documenting the Partition of India and Pakistan to a cancer researcher telling the stories of trauma experienced by cancer survivors. Noa lives in Berkeley, California, with her husband, Jack, and their two daughters, Alma and Leila.
Is there a genre of music that influences your writing/thinking? Do you listen to music while you write?
My parents are both classical musicians—my father is a pianist and my mother is a cellist—and I grew up in a house filled with music. Classical music is part of my mother tongue, my home language, and it evokes emotional experiences in me that I then try to translate into language and story.
Favorite non-reading activity?
I love to go hiking. I’m lucky to live in a place where—unless it’s raining—it’s usually hiking weather! I love being immersed in nature, and especially among the redwood trees, where I always feel a deep sense of ease in my body and connection to the natural world.
Do you have another artistic outlet in addition to your writing? Do you sew? Paint? Draw? Knit? Dance?
I love to sing, and especially to sing and make music with friends. So much of my life as a lover of books (and therefore as a writer, reader, and editor) takes place in the mind and the intellect (and also the soul, of course). I love singing because of the way it releases me from the mind, because of the way it feels in my body, and the sense of being part of something bigger than myself when I sing with others.
What do you worry about?
The line that comes to mind is the first line of Wendell Berry’s poem “The Peace of Wild Things,” which reads: “When despair for the world grows in me/ and I wake in the night at the least sound/ in fear of what my life and my children’s lives may be…” This about sums it up for me.
What brings you great joy?
Watching my daughters, who are 4 and 2, love each other.
