Summarize this content to 2000 words in 6 paragraphs in Arabic Unlock the Editor’s Digest for freeRoula Khalaf, Editor of the FT, selects her favourite stories in this weekly newsletter.On his 39th birthday, Leonard Cohen was experiencing a kind of midlife crisis. He was living with his partner and her young son on the Greek island of Hydra. Earlier in the year he had alluded to retiring, telling Melody Maker, “I don’t feel I want to have the same involvement with [music]. It’s over.”The following month, on October 6 1973, Egypt and Syria launched a surprise, co-ordinated attack on Israel. It was Yom Kippur, the holiest day in the Jewish calendar, and the ensuing war lasted for 19 days.On hearing the news, Cohen felt a sudden calling, describing in his diary the appeal of the “excitement of war against this ordeal of [domestic] warmth and monotony”. He travelled to Israel and performed a series of intimate concerts for troops who had come from, or were preparing to head to, the battlefield.“Who by Fire” is a loose reworking of the Yom Kippur prayer “Unetanneh Tokef”, which is thought to be at least 1,000 years old. It features the lines “Who will die at his time and who before his time; who by water and who by fire.” While the original refers to biblical causes of death (beast, thirst, plague, stoning), Cohen’s list is more eclectic, spanning the banal (slow decay) and the cryptic (“in your merry merry month of May”). Each verse concludes with the slow refrain, “And who shall I say is calling?”, apparently wondering who is out there or what has given them the authority to dictate life and death.The studio recording is just two and a half minutes long, but Cohen often stretched it out during live shows with extended instrumentals. Most notably, in a 1989 Cohen performance, saxophonist Sonny Rollins breathed new life into this song of death, harmonising with Cohen’s vocals and delivering emphatic solos. Back on tour in the 2010s Cohen performed with Spanish guitarist Javier Mas, whose lengthy, trembling intros heightened the song’s connection with the deep past.Let us know your memories of ‘Who by Fire’ in the comments section belowThe paperback edition of ‘The Life of a Song: The stories behind 100 of the world’s best-loved songs’, edited by David Cheal and Jan Dalley, is published by ChambersMusic credits: Sony; Buck 65/Warner; Partisan; ABC Signature
