There’s an interesting dialogue at Standpoint Online (I’d never heard of it before) between Israeli author AB Yehoshua and British author Howard Jacobson.  (Via Jeffrey Goldberg, of course.)  I don’t agree with everything they say, but really appreciate their discussion the legacy of the Holocaust and how it intersects with discourse about Israel:

AB Yehoshua: …Where is this coming from, this extraordinary hostility, this attempt to deprive the Jewish people of its unique suffering?

Howard Jacobson: I can tell you what it is, but I’m not sure I can tell you where it comes from, because it comes from many sources; from outside Jews, and also very crucially from within Judaism. Lots of Jews are up to this trick, or whatever we call it. I see it as a new and much more sinister kind of Holocaust denial. Holocaust denial we can deal with now. Most of the world knows about it. We recognise the look of the people who do it and we know the nonsense of it, we just leave them alone and let them get on with it. But this is much more sinister and much more appealing, this one goes: “It was a terrible thing that happened to the Jews. We all know what a terrible thing Auschwitz was. Look, we concede it, you poor Jews.” It’s necessary that they demonstrate their degree of empathy for us. But what follows the sympathy is an analysis – a psychoanalysis – that is far from sympathetic: “You were traumatised by the Holocaust into visiting a Holocaust of your own upon the Palestinians.” It’s like the abused child who grows up and abuses the next child. We are now described as abusing the Palestinians in exactly the same terms as the Germans abused us – “abused” for God’s sake! And in this way, we are actually made to pay for the Holocaust itself. I talk about it as a kind of retrospective guilt for the Holocaust. It’s almost as if we’ve turned time the wrong way round, that because of what we are now doing to the Palestinians, we lose the right to the dignity of the Holocaust, if you can call it dignity.

This is a very sinister move. It’s at the heart of the Caryl Churchill play [Seven Jewish Children, performed at the Royal Court Theatre] and you get a lot of it at the universities, because it’s appealing in its neatness, it’s vaguely post-modern, you can mention Freud, you can chase around the names of several fashionable intellectuals. It is also very sinister, because it begs the question of what Israel is in fact doing or not doing to the Palestinians. Jewish trauma elides into Palestinian trauma, the cruelty Jews suffered into the cruelty Jews now dispense. It is not only that unequal things are equalised, but that the equalising settles the question of what is happening between the waring parties. Accept that the done-to have become the doers and the issue is settled…

I have to say I agree with Jacobson here.  It’s an absurd and tragic symptom of the obsession with collective psychology that we are even engaging in this discussion.  Despite all of Israel’s shortcomings when it comes to human rights,it is despicable to me to equate the Israelis with Nazis.  I think that Jacobson begins to explain why.

Posted by Naomi Firestone

It’s your lucky day…we just posted reviews of the following titles online:

THE JEWISH BODY
Melvin Konner
Reviewed by Maron L. Waxman

FREE-RANGE CHICKENS
Simon Rich
Reviewed by Alan Zweibel

WANDERING STARS: A NOVEL
Sholem Aleichem; Aliza Shevrin, trans.; Tony Kushner, fwd.
Reviewed by Cherie Karo Schwartz

LAISH
Aharon Appelfeld
Reviewed by Malvina D. Engelberg

FRIENDLY FIRE
A. B. Yehoshua
Reviewed by Michal Hoschander Malen

To read these reviews, and more, please visit: http://jewishbookcouncil.org/page.php?88

I have a two new books that I either bought or received as Advanced Reader Copies.

I purchased My Jesus Year: A Rabbi’s Son Wanders the Bible Belt in Search of His Own Faith, by Benyamin Cohen.

I received an Advanced Reader’s Copy of “Good Book: The Bizarre, Hilarious, Disturbing, Marvelous, and Inspiring Things I Learned When I Read Every Single Word of the Bible , by David Plotz. Thank you, Kyle.

I am in the midst of reading Friendly Fire, by A.B. Yehoshua. So far it is an excellent read. He is one of my favorite authors.

Shabbat Shalom, everyone!
~~~~~~
Jew Wishes…Peace to you all.
© Copyright 2007 – All Rights Reserved – No permission is given or allowed to reuse my photography, book reviews, writings, or my poetry in any form/format without my express written consent/permission.

Thursday February 26, 2009 – 2nd of Adar, 5769

Primera novel·la traduida al català d’aquest escriptor jueu.

Una Dona a Jerusalem

De A.B. Yehoshua

Traducció de Roser Lluch

Barcelona. Proa 2008

304 pags, 18.00 €

No tant conegut com d’altres autors jueus, Amos Oz o David Grossman, A.B. Yehoshua ens narra en la seva primera obra traduïda, i molt bé per la Roser Lluch, al català, el pelegrinatge del cos difunt d’una dona tàrtara des de Jerusalem fins al remot poble on va néixer.

La dona, enginyera i emigrant possiblement sense papers, mor en un atemptat al centre mateix de Jerusalem. Degut a una sèrie de embolics

Jerusalem

 personals i administratius, aquesta dona encara hi és sense identificar però en nòmina de la gran panificadora on treballava com a dona de la neteja, dies després d’haver deixat de treballar-hi. Sota la pressió d’un setmanari meitat publicitari, meitat sensacionalista, l’octogenari cap de l’empresa es veu obligat a fer els impossibles per endur el cos de la dona al seu poble natal tal com ho vol el seu únic fill. Al capdamunt de l’operació, el gran capo posa al seu cap de departament de Recursos Humans. Aquest innominat senyor, antic militar i ex-comercial agressiu de la panificadora, desplegarà totes les seves arts per complir amb la seva missió.

La difunta Iúlia Ragaiev serà el centre de totes les accions, omissions, pensaments i obsessions de tota una sèrie de personatges amb els que en A.B. Yehoshua ens vol mostrar les reaccions dels éssers humans davant de la mort d’un altre ésser humà amb el que s’ha mantingut una relació mes o menys propera. Tenim al fill, tàrtar de mena, que s’entesta en enterrar la mare en el seu poble i en el que veiem reflectit la joventut actual; l’ex-marit que intentarà treure profit de la mort de l’ex-dona; el company de feina mig enamorat de la morta i principal causant de tot l’embolic; els periodistes del setmanari groc que volen fer carrera aprofitant-se d’un fet com aquest; el capo podrit de diners i amb mala consciència i el cap de Recursos Humans que primer s’agafa la missió com una ordre de la direcció passant després a ésser un repte personal,  per acabar patint una mena d’enamorament de la dona i fent del viatge al poble tàrtar una mena de necessitat vital i d’expiació de culpes pròpies i alienes.

“    -    Vostè no sap en quin país es troba. No hi ha cap aeroport als voltants d’on ella      

           viu.

-         No li podem enviar un helicòpter?

-         Un helicòpter?-va sospirar la cònsol-. Ja veig que somia. D’on ha tret aquesta idea? Pensi en la distància…A més qui ho pagaria?

-         Diguem que nosaltres participaríem en les despeses- va dir el cap de Recursos Humans amb cautela. De sobte sentia unes ganes irresistibles de trobar l’anciana mare de la difunta”

L’acció transcorre entre Jerusalem on viu i treballa la finada i Mongòlia

Mongòlia

on la porten per ser enterrada. L’autor no pretén en cap moment mostrar-nos com és la vida al Jerusalem actual ni res de l’idiosincràsia dels jueus. La protagonista mor en un atemptat, se suposa que islàmic però també podia haver mort d’una colitis i Jerusalem només és un teló de fons, la ciutat podria haver estat qualsevol ciutat moderna del món, molt perillosa, però quina no ho és. Amb Mongòlia passa el mateix, la dona és d’aquests país però podia haver nascut a qualsevol indret del món amb la condició de que fos un lloc pobre i endarrerit. Amb això vull dir que el que realment l’interessa al senyor A.B. Yehoshua es mostrar-nos com poden reaccionar diferents éssers humans davant de la mort d’una persona, tant si és un ésser proper com un fill o un marit o una mare, tant si es té una relació llunyana: el cap de Recursos Humans o gairebé paternal: el capo, o fins i tot sense cap tracte però de la que es pot treure un profit: els periodistes. Aquestes relacions ens les mostra l’autor amb un llenguatge viu i clar, ple de diàlegs, petites descripcions i frases curtes que ens ajuden a llegir aquesta bona novel·la d’una tirada.

Un munt de petits detalls amagats per l’A.B. enriqueixen la novel.la que en una lectura ràpida ens pot semblar només un “road-book” o una novel.la d’aventures moderna però que en el fons ens parla de la solitud de l’individu en la societat actual, de les diferències de classes, de les aspiracions humanes …

Original també es l’estructura de l’obra, on al començament de cada canvi d’escenari els espectadors de l’acció ens expliquen en primera persona com a viscut aquest fet en concret. Aquesta estructura em recorda molt a la emprada per la Belén Gopegui fa uns anys en la seva magnífica novel·la “Lo Real”. No sé si el senyor Yehoshua coneixerà a la Belén…

“ Vet aquí que ja fa cinc nits que no podem descansar, des del deia que ens vam assabentar del que li havia passat. Hem sabut que el fèretre ha travessat el riu gelat amb el darrer transbordador acompanyat per un blindat militar i una gran delegació, i encara no tenim notícia de la mare. Què farem? Què direm a la delegació que ens torna l’enginyera convertida en una senzilla dona de fer feines morta en una guerra que no era seva?”

AB Yehoshua, a popular Israeli novelist, writes an open letter on Haaretz to Gideon Levy, and Israeli pro-Palestinian activist, about his coverage of the latest Gaza offensive. Gideon Levy responds. Read.

Dear Gideon,

The writer is an Israeli author. His latest novel, “Friendly Fire,” was published in recent months.

Here is the response from Gideon Levy.

Dear Bulli,

In friendship, despite everything,

Posted by Naomi Firestone

An interesting piece on A.B. Yehoshua’s new novel Friendly Fire: http://www.nytimes.com/2008/11/27/books/27Eder.html?emc=eta1

Register now for the library’s free five-part reading and discussion series: “Let’s Talk about It: Jewish Literature – Identity and Imagination,” sponsored by a grant from Nextbook and the American Library Association. We will explore Jewish literature and culture through scholar-led discussions of contemporary and classic books on the theme: “Your Heart’s Desire: Sex and Love in Jewish Literature.”  In these works of modern fiction, love and desire cross paths – in the math department, on the analyst’s couch, in an Israeli garage – often with surprising results:  an arranged marriage heats up, a ménage à trois turns cozy!

Please join us for stimulating discussions with the leadership of distinguished Florida Atlantic University Professor Dr. Marianne Sanua, winner of FAU Researcher of the Year Award and the Sidney and Hadassah Musher Publication Prize awarded by the National Foundation for Jewish Culture.

The first program will explore Portnoy’s Complaint by Philip Roth on Sunday, October 19, 2008 from 2:00 to 4:00 p.m.  Additional books will be discussed each month:                                                                   

• The Little Disturbances of Man by Grace Paley on November 16, 2008
• A Simple Story by S. Y. Agnon on December 14, 2008
• The Lover by A. B. Yehoshua on January 11, 2009
• The Mind-Body Problem by Rebecca Goldstein on February 8, 2009

We are delighted to have been chosen to host this unique series.

For details or to register, please call 561-868-7701, or visit the Library’s Information Desk.

El 15 de mayo Israel celebra el 60 aniversario de su nacimiento como Estado Judío. Se están publicando varios artículos con motivo de la ocasión. Me gustaría compartir con mis lectores uno de Jeffrey Goldberg, corresponsal de la revista mensual estadounidense The Atlantic Monthly, que resulta especialmente importante y de interés y que aparece en su número de mayo. 

Goldberg comparte las esperanzas, temores y un presentimiento de los israelíes durante los prolegómenos de la celebración de un hito relevante en la historia de su país. 

El tema principal del artículo es la conversión de Ehud Olmert, el actual Primer Ministro israelí, que deja de ser un firme creyente en el derecho de Israel a mantener su poder en Cisjordania y Gaza, un pilar ideológico básico de los políticos israelíes de derechas. Según Goldberg, Olmert “ha llegado a creer que una retirada del territorio palestino resultaba de interés urgente para Israel.” La pregunta del millón es cuáles son los principales obstáculos para ejecutar dicha decisión. 

Además de Olmert, Goldberg entrevistó a tres destacados  escritores israelíes, Amos Oz, A.B.Yehoshua y David Grossman. Los tres  han defendido la idea de un acuerdo territorial con los palestinos y han expresado su dolor por la actual política de colonización que se lleva a cabo en los territorios ocupados, respaldada por los sucesivos gobiernos israelíes. 

Las declaraciones de David Grossman eran las más dramáticas. Autor de varios libros como See Under: Love (1986)  y The Yellow Wind (1987), Grossman perdió a su hijo de 20 años, Uri, durante la guerra del verano de 2006 en Líbano. Uri era un comandante de tanques. Esta tragedia personal hizo patente para Grossman los muchos retos y temores con que los israelíes se enfrentan. “Una de las muchas contradicciones para Israel en su séptima década de independencia es la siguiente: es un país donde el judaísmo está a salvo, pero no los judíos.” 

Grossman, un sionista que combatió en el ejército de su país, está preocupado por la oposición árabe a la creación y futura existencia de un estado judío. “Esta oposición no les ha aportado nada en absoluto a los palestinos: su movimiento de liberación nacional es posiblemente el que menos éxito ha cosechado de todos los que se han dado en el siglo XX. Pero el fracaso no ha menguado el deseo de muchos musulmanes de ver el fin de Israel, y el éxito definitivo de la idea sionista depende no sólo de la habilidad de Israel en mantener a sus ciudadanos con vida, sino de su capacidad de poner fin al debate sobre su permanencia.” 

En noviembre de 2006, durante un oficio religioso conmemorando la vida de Yitzhak Rabin, el ex primer ministro israelí asesinado por un extremista judío en 1995, Grossman habló con Olmert abiertamente. Le rogó al actual primer ministro israelí que se dirigiera directamente al pueblo palestino. 

“Pase por encima de Hamás para llegar a ellos. Acuda a los moderados, aquellos quienes como Vd. y yo se oponen a Hamás y a sus métodos. Acérquese al pueblo palestino, hable de su profundo dolor y heridas, reconozca su continuo sufrimiento. Su estatus no se verá disminuido en el futuro, ni tampoco el de Israel en las posibles negociaciones. Pero se abrirán los corazones de la gente un poco los unos a los otros, y esta apertura conlleva mucho poder.” 

Son palabras llenas de fuerza de un padre de luto. ¿Llegarán a filtrarse en los corazones y mentes de los extremistas en ambos lados, tanto el palestino como el israelí? 

www.theatlantic.com/palestine 

VOICES FROM ISRAEL

On May 15 Israel celebrates the 60th anniversary of its birth as a Jewish State. Several articles are being published for this occasion. I thought to share with my readers an interesting and important article by Jeffrey Goldberg, national correspondent of the US monthly magazine, The Atlantic Monthly,  published in its May issue. 

Goldberg shares the hopes, fears and a sense of foreboding of Israelis getting ready to celebrate an important event in their state’s history. 

Fundamentally, Goldberg writes about the conversion of Ehud Olmert, the current Israeli Prime Minister, from being a firm believer in Israel’s right to keep its hold on the West Bank and Gaza, a major ideological mainstay of Israeli rightwing politicians. According to Goldberg, Olmert “has come to believe that a withdrawal from Palestinian territory was in the urgent best interest of Israel.” The key question is what are the obstacles facing such a decision. 

In addition to Olmert himself, Goldberg interviewed three prominent Israeli writers, Amos Oz, A.B. Yehoshua, and David Grossman. The three authors have all defended the idea of a territorial compromise with the Palestinians and expressed their distress at the ongoing settlement policy in the occupied territories supported by successive Israeli governments. 

David Grossman’s statements were the most dramatic. Author of several books such as See Under: Love (1986)  and The Yellow Wind (1987) Grossman lost his 20-year-old son, Uri, during the summer 2006 war in Lebanon. Uri was a tank commander. This personal tragic event led Grossman to emphasize the many challenges and fears facing Israelis today. ” One of the many contradictions Israel faces in the seventh decade of independence is this: it is a country that is safe for Judaism, but not for Jews.” 

Grossman, a Zionist who fought in his country’s army, is worried about Arab opposition to the creation and continued existence of a Jewish state. “This opposition has, of course, gotten the Palestinians nothing; theirs is perhaps the least successful national liberation movement of the 20^th century. But failure has not diminished the desire of many Muslims to see the end of Israel, and the ultimate success of the Zionist idea depends not only on Israel’s ability to keep its citizens alive but on its ability to end talk of its impermanence.” 

In November 2006 during a memorial service for Yitzhak Rabin, the former Israeli prime minister assassinated by a Jewish extremist in 1995, Grossman addressed Olmert directly. He pleaded with the current Israeli prime minister to address the Palestinian people directly. 

“Go over the head of Hamas to them. Go to the moderates among them, the ones, who like me and you, oppose Hamas and its ways. Go to the Palestinian people. Speak to their deep grief and wounds, recognize their continued suffering. Your status will not be diminished, nor will that of Israel in any future negotiations. But people’s hearts will begin to open a little to one another, and this opening has huge power.” 

These are powerful words from a grieving father. Will these words seep into the hearts and minds of the extremists on both the Palestinian and Israeli sides? 

www.theatlantic.com/palestine

“A Late Divorce”, by A.B. Yehoshua, is a novel that was translated from the Hebrew by Hillel Halkin. The story line revolves around Yehuda and his wife Naomi.

Yehuda has traveled from America, back to his homeland of Israel, in order to obtain a divorce from his wife, Naomi, so he can marry a forty-something, pregnant woman.  Here is where the tour-de-force begins. “A Late Divorce“, in my opinion, has a dual purpose, and is a true tour-de-force novel with its story lines regarding family dynamics, within the tapestry of the State of Israel, a country whose own threads encompass its own state of dynamics, culturally, emotionally, physically and geographically. Obtaining the divorce requires strength, and is no easy feat for Yehuda, and his determination has thrown his family members into a state of emotional turmoil, through is own comical tactics.

The book takes place over a period of nine days that lead up to the Passover celebration. Each day (a chapter in the book) is devoted to one family member’s perspective, not only on the divorce, but family life in general, and how they remember Yehuda’s time spent with them. Yehoshua is masterful in his ability to get inside the human mind, and see life through nine family members, each bringing a different analysis to the current familial situation.

For some, the situation is unbearable, and for others, daily verbal assaults and torture is a way of life, thinly disguised as joking. We have the character of Gaddi on Sunday, a seven-year old, and grandson of Yehuda. We are privvy to his thoughts within his racing mind, and Yehoshua is ingenious in the way he presents Gaddi, unarticulated, fast talking, thoughts running from one subject to the next. Yet, within his immaturity, we also see a Gaddi who seems persceptive, and a child who exhibits emotions turned inward.

Monday brings us Yisra’el Kedmi, Yehuda’s son-in-law, married to Ya’el. He is called Kedmi, as he feels one Israel is enough. Kedmi is more of an “out-law” than an in-law. He is the “jokester”, the one who demonstrates passive-aggressive behavior through his obnoxious and snide remarks. Yet, he might just be the sanest of the bunch. It’s all up to the reader.

Tuesday is Dina’s day. She is Asi’s wife, and Asi is the son of Yehuda. She is an only child of Hungarian parents, who are Hasidic Jews, who are constantly at her for not having children. Dina is an aspiring writer. Her writing is her family, each page is like one of her children.

Wednesday is Asi’s voice, one that is told in an environment of familial sadness. Asi has a passion for 19th century terrorists and their history, and he lectures at the university. He has a compulsion that is harmful to himself, and it began when he was a child. Asi acts openly superior to his wife, Dina, and treats her as if she is a child. He has yet to fulfill his marriage by having sexual relations with Dina.

Thursday we hear a one-sided conversation that Refa’el Calderon has with Tsvi. Tsvi is Yehuda’s son, and Refa’el is Tsvi’s current lover. Not only is the conversation one-sided, but so is the relationship, as Tsvi treats Refa’el with extreme disrespect. Refa’el is of Sephardic Jewish heritage.

Friday is the day that Tsvi meets with his therapist, right before Shabbat evening prayer service begins. He is an extremely manipulative person, and is always looking for an easy and quick way to make money, even if it is at another’s expense. He has convinced his mother not to sign the divorce agreement until she is given the entire share of the apartment that she and Yehuda own. Tsvi lives in Tel Aviv.

Saturday is not only the Sabbath, but is a day that takes place three years into the future. We are seeing the day through Ya’el’s mind and eyes, as she tries to focus on the past and remember what events occurred. What tragic incident happened that has caused her to block her memory of the day. Ya’el has been the quiet force in the family, always trying to please everyone. Also, in this chapter we are introduced to Connie, who was Yehuda’s bride-to-be, and their son.

Sunday is the day of the Passover Seder, and we meet Naomi, Yehuda’s wife. She has been confined to a mental hospital ever since she stabbed Yehuda. She has been labeled as crazy, although I am not so sure that she is. She has many coherent and cognizant moments, more than other family members.

Monday is Yehuda’s story, his memories and perspectives. We begin to see the overall picture in this chapter more clearly. And, we realize who is manipulative, and who is trying to drive the other to madness. The greed and guilt combine, bringing out emotions that were harbored and festered to a crescendo of an ending.

The stories within the chapters of “A Late Divorce” are a metaphor for dysfunctional family relationships and interactions, and a metaphor for the daily lives and dynamics that make up the fabric of Israel’s very core. We see the comparison through Yehoshua’s characters. “A Late Divorce” is a story filled with sadness and humor, both. Yet, the sadness is dominant, as each family member tries to heal the family as a unit, as a whole, and put it back together, failing in their endeavors. There is never peace, in any situation, and each family member is constantly on guard, often on guard for the unknown and unseen forces, as if awaiting disaster. Each voice is a thread in the fabric of the whole, the complete tapestry is told with the incomparable voice and brilliance of A.B. Yehoshua. He is masterful in his word visuals, and brings incredible insight into the human mind and emotions, blending both in a concise and astute vision of both family and the State of Israel. “A Late Divorce” is a book not to be missed.

I personally own and have read this book.

~~~~~~

Jew Wishes…Peace to you all.
© Copyright 2007 – All Rights Reserved – No permission is given or allowed to reuse my photography, book reviews, writings, or my poetry in any form/format without my expresss written consent/permission.

Inaugurato da poche ore il Salone del libro di Parigi, dedicato ai 60 anni d’Israele, alla presenza di Shimon Peres e dal ministro della cultura francese Christine Albanel. Ha scritto Le Monde: “Una fiera in ostaggio”. In ostaggio, come la Fiera del Libro di Torino, di paesi arabi, scrittori ed editori di lingua araba, perchè Israele è l’ ospite d’ onore.

Per il boicottaggio si sono schierati scrittori ed editori arabi, così come i paesi arabi Algeria, Iran, Libano, Marocco, Arabia Saudita, Tunisia e Yemen. Ha detto Al-Moutawakel Taha, presidente dell’Unione degli scrittori palestinesi: “Non è degno della Francia, paese della rivoluzione e dei diritti dell’uomo, accogliere nella sua Fiera del libro un paese d’occupazione razzista”.

Replica il ministro degli esteri Bernard Kouchner: “Le idee non si possono boicottare. Mi auguro non si voglia boicottare anche la pace in Medio Oriente”. Ha aggiunto l’Eliseo: “E’ veramente una cattiva pratica quella di boicottare un luogo di cultura, d’ incontro internaziobnale. I libri non si devono temere”.

Così Peres ha detto: “Il boicottaggio non è molto intelligente. Quelli che boicottano, boicottano se stessi”. Peres ha compiuto una visita di cinque giorni in Francia, ha incontrato il presidente Nicolas Sarkozy. Ha detto il numero uno di Francia: “Come amico d’ Israele, le devo il linguaggio della verità. La sicurezza d’ Israele passa per la cessazione degli insediamenti”.

Il Salone, che accoglie ogni anno circa 200 mila visitatori, interverranno 39 scrittori israeliani come David Grossman, Amoz Oz, Abraham B. Yehoshua. Ha spiegato Amos Oz: “Quelli che fanno appello al boicottaggio non si oppongono alla politica di Israele, ma alla sua stessa esistenza. Se dicono che Israele non deve essere al salone è perchè pensano semplicemente che non debba esistere”.

E ha detto lo scrittore Meir Shalev: “Essere scandalizzati per la celebrazione del sessantesimo anniversario dello stato significa che si sarebbe preferito che questo paese non avesse mai visto la luce”.

The Paris Book Fair and The Turin International Book Fair. The Paris Book Fair is scheduled to open on March 14, 2008, and the Turin Book Fair is scheduled to open May 8, 2008. The Book Fairs have stirred protests among Italian Arab authors and intellects, as well as political factions. The protests are calling for the book fairs to be boycotted, because Israel has been selected to be the guest of honor at the opening of the book fairs. Israel celebrates its 6oth anniversary as a nation, this year.

According to A.B. Yehoshua, “The aim of culture and literature is not to build barriers among people, but to open up to others.”

Author Meir Shalev stated, “I know there are hostilities against Israel, but I never thought it would come down to a boycott of art and literature.”

Mohamed Salmawy has stated that the decision, “has antagonized Arab public opinion.”

Read the full article, here.

Some authors have stated that they are considering not attending, as they don’t want to become part of a potential and possible political event and protest.

~~~~~~

Jew Wishes…Peace to you all.
© Copyright 2007 – All Rights Reserved – No permission is given or allowed to reuse my photography, book reviews, writings, or my poetry in any form/format without my expresss written consent/permission.

The Liberated Bride by A.B. Yeshoshua is a study on the meaning of borders, boundaries, and crossings. It is also a story about relationships and interactions, from familial to friendship, student, professor to writer. Although it has comic moments and visuals of comic relief, it is not a comedy, but is a serious and insightful novel. Yet, it can be defined as somewhat of a farce (I know, I know, that sounds like a bit of an oxymoron), as the pace of the book is somewhat frantic and filled with anxious and tense moments, much like the actions of Yochanan Rivlin, the main character. Yehoshua deftly conveys a roller coaster of emotions in “The Liberated Bride“.

The novel winds from first person to second person, more than once, but always from Rivlin’s perspective. He has recently retired as a Near-Eastern Studies Department Chair. He is obsessed with the fact that he has no answers as to why his son (who lives in Paris) is divorced from his bride of one-year, and he intrudes in every aspect in order to find out the answer. He steps outside of acceptable privacy boundaries with his manipulative behavior, past the point of no return, and past the possibility of stepping back to assess and admit the truth of his actions to himself.

The book opens at a Palestinian wedding, where Samaher (the bride) has invited Jewish professors to attend. In fact, the wedding is being put on strictly for them, as she already has been legally married within her Arab environment. Samaher is a student, working on her degree, and she eventually suffers from depression (a form of dropping out on reality, which in some weird sense can be viewed as liberating).  He hates attending weddings, as they remind him of his son Ofer”s marriage and divorce five years earlier.

Rivlin wants to leave the wedding early, but his wife (a bride of sorts), Hagit, encourages him to stay. They have had a long and successful marriage, but his wife is constantly trying to discourage him from trying to find out why his son divorced, and is quite assertive through her attitude and verbalizations to Rivlin regarding his absurd escapades and fiascos (some of them she doesn’t find out until after the fact). That facet of his personality irritates her. She is a well-respected and successful district judge, independent woman. Her job requires her to make difficult decisions and rulings when people cross the boundaries of the law, much like a Biblical Deborah. She also understands the need for privacy, as she handles top-secret cases. She believes in structure in life, whereas Rivlin seems to dismiss them. He is in a constant state of obsession, always searching for the unknown answers, as the historian in him emerges at every turn, to the dismay of others.

Rivlin’s own family members travel worldwide, from city to country to continent, back and forth, crossing borders,  internationally and culturally. They almost always attend a wedding in their travels.  Rivlin himself travels the highways and roads of Israel, crossing borders, both physically and emotionally, as he manipulates everyone in his life, in his unyielding search for answers.

The book details much of daily life in the Middle East, and our senses are filled with activity, smells, tastes, sights and sounds, and also the conflicts within different cultures residing in the same country (the book was written before the current problems and situation). Each culture is dependent on each other, intradependent, and interdependent on each other within the cultural independence. Each person is dependent on their own culture, and also other cultures for survival. Each person is seeking truth. He brings strong human elements to the characters. Parents from one culture do not necessarily fit the mold of the other culture.

Being a parent doesn’t give you exclusivity into the lives of your child, and your need-to-know diminishes when they become adults. Yehoshua is brilliant in his insight regarding familial bonds and the ties that bind family members, and also brilliant in his assessment of familial boundaries and privacy, and what constitutes invasion of that privacy.

There are other brides, other aspects of the almost 600-page book that I won’t delve into, that you should read yourself.

Yehoshua leaves us to wonder who or what exactly “The Liberated Bride” is, as the word “bride” takes on many connotations, including “bridge”. Is the bride a human being/s, state of being or mindset, a country, or is it a combination of all those factors. That is the brilliance of Yehoshua, his ability to convey and bring substance to the characters and the country in The Liberated Bride. Yehoshua was born in Jerusalem, and his own understanding of Israel is intense and runs deep. That is clearly evident in his excellent and masterful writing, with his gift for weaving diverse fabrics and threads into a tapestry of life.

Read this book yourself and make your own judgements as to who or what the bride is or represents.

~~~~~~

I personally own and have read this book.

Jew Wishes…Peace to you all.
© Copyright 2007 – All Rights Reserved – No permission is given or allowed to reuse my photography, book reviews, writings, or my poetry in any form/format without my expresss written consent/permission.

I am an avid reader.  I cannot get enough reading into one 24-hour period.  I read both non-fiction, as well as fiction.  As far as fiction, I prefer historical fiction.  In January I started keeping track of the books I have read, by name and author.  I want to see how many I read by the end of the year.

This list will let you see the a small portion of Jewish-related books I have read so far this year, or plan to read, and it is only a partial listing of the books.   The rest are books that don’t have any story line related to Judaism, or any non-fiction Jewish element to them.

American Pastoral – by Philip Roth

Book of Daniel, The  – by E.L. Doctorow

Brooklyn Follies, The – by Paul Aster

City of Glory, The, – by Beveryl Swerling

Einstein, His Life and Universe – by Walter Isaacson

Girl in the Red Coat, The – by Roma Ligocka

Hester Among The Ruins – by Binnie Kirshenbaum

Invisible Wall, The – by Harry Bernstein

Kalooki Nights – by Howard Jacobson

In My Mother’s House – by Margaret McMullen

Irene Nemirovsky – by Jonathan Weiss

Life Beyond the Holocaust – by Mira Ryczke Kimmelman

Sala’s Gift – by Ann Kirschner

Simon’s Family – by Marianne Fredriksson

Time of the Uprooted, The – by Elie Wiesel

A Woman in Jerusalem – by A.B. Yehoshua

I have several books relating to Judaism on my to-read stack, including (but definitely not limited to):

A Day of Small Beginnings – by Lisa Pearl Rosenbaum

The Foreign Correspondent – by Alan Furst

Marjorie Morningstar – by Herman Wouk

Messengers of God – by Elie Wiesel

Truth About Lou, The – by Angela Von Der Lippe

Jew Wishes…Peace to you all.
© Copyright 2007 – All Rights Reserved – No permission is given or allowed to reuse my photography, book reviews, writings, or my poetry in any form/format without my expresss written consent/permission.

Due to a very chaotic life in the past weeks, it took a while to start posting regularly here, but now we’re off! I have some almost finished reviews so I should start to post regularly from now on. I will try to put up a post every week or ten days with the books that I read about in reviews, blogs or elsewhere that I added to my want-to-read list. This  time they are (in random order).

In this article from The Guardian six feminists are asked about the “the writing that first opened their eyes to the women’s movement”. The article mentions more than one book or writer I’d like to read, but I’m particularly interested in this one:

[...] Brothers, by the late Bernice Rubens, was a fictional trawl through Jewish history, beginning with the build up to the pogroms in the late 1800s. It followed the fate of two brothers named Bindel, and their descendants, in order to question how certain groups of people become oppressed. The book’s analysis of how colonisation of any one people builds and is maintained spoke volumes to me.

Also, Virginia Woolf is mentioned as an inspiration. Over the last year or so, for whatever reason she keeps popping up in things I read, so I have become very interested in reading her works. So far I’ve only read some excerpts from her diaries, which did whet my appetite for more.

From the New York Times Sunday Book Reviews of the last two weeks, I noticed these:

Like You’d Understand Anyway: Stories – Jim Shepard:

Shepard’s surprising, enthralling tales feature such diverse characters as a Parisian executioner, a woman in space and two Nazi scientists searching for the yeti.

An Arsonist’s Guide to Writers’ Homes in New England – Brock Clarke:

No writer’s house — neither Frost’s, nor Twain’s, nor Wharton’s, nor Thoreau’s — is safe in this comic whodunit.

Murder in Amsterdam: Liberal Europe, Islam and the Limits of Tolerance – Ian Buruma:

Buruma, who was born in the Netherlands but has lived mostly abroad for the past 30 years, has made a career of analyzing foreign cultures. Here he returns to his native land to examine the 2004 murder of the filmmaker Theo van Gogh. A Dutch-born Islamist of Moroccan descent shot van Gogh, angry at “Submission,” a film he had made with the Somali-born femi nist Ayaan Hirsi Ali about the treatment of women under Islam. Buruma tries to understand why the Dutch multi cultural experiment has not gone well, despite the government’s liberal immigration policies and lavish social services. More important than Islam’s influence, Buruma suggests, is “the question of authority … in a society from which a young Moroccan male might find it easier to receive subsidies than respect.”

A Woman in Jerusalem – A. B. Yehoshua:

When an unidentified woman is killed in a suicide bombing at a Jerusalem market, the owner of the bakery where (it is eventually discovered) she worked asks his human resources manager to find out what happened and to make amends. This bureaucrat, who is never named, brings the woman’s body to her mother’s village in a former Soviet republic. Wrestling with the indifference of authorities, the hostility of the woman’s relatives and his own failed marriage, the man is transformed into a morally engaged individual and even a sort of hero.

Death of a Writer – Michael Collins:

This darkly funny murder mystery takes on a liberal-arts college English department. When a professor sinks into a coma after a failed suicide attempt, a graduate student discovers the thriller he wrote about the murder of a young girl that was quietly published some years earlier. The book becomes a sensation and attracts the attention of a local detective, who turns up evidence that it may not be fiction.

Well-Behaved Women Seldom Make History – Laurel Thatcher Ulrich:

Ulrich [...] uses “three classic works in Western feminism” as a springboard for examining the theme of “bad” behavior. Could the popularity of her slogan, she wondered, be explained by “feminism, postfeminism or something much older?” The answer emerges in Ulrich’s choice of texts: Christine de Pizan’s “Book of the City of Ladies,” written in 1405; Elizabeth Cady Stanton’s “Eighty Years and More,” published in 1898; and “A Room of One’s Own,” based on two lectures Virginia Woolf gave in 1928 — all works by women who “turned to history as a way of making sense of their own lives.” History, Ulrich reminds us, “isn’t just what happens in the past,” but what we choose to remember. As much invention as discovery, history attempts to make the chaotic present into a coherent picture by comparing it to images, equally artificial, fashioned from events long past.[...]Ulrich’s new book is a work of selection and synthesis; she finds common archetypes in far-flung sources, making connections that are sometimes distant but never tenuous. The “Amazons” chapter is illustrated by examples from archaeological digs in Kazakhstan, South American folk tales and her own cultural backyard, which yields “an Olympic athlete, a female soldier, a lesbian separatist, a comic-book heroine.” Her associative logic reveals how A prefigures Q or even Z rather than ordering A before B before C, and brings a female sensibility to what is more typically the linear, cause-and-effect formula of history, a majority of which, Ulrich points out, is written by men.

You can read the first chapter here.

Other Colors: Essays and a Story – Orhan Pamuk:

In “Other Colors”, his first big assemblage of nonfiction, Pamuk gives us several of his many selves in a centrifugal gathering of memory-pieces, sketches, interviews and unexpected flights. The result is a gallery of Pamuks: here is the author of the haunted, half-lit inquiry into melancholy and neglect, “Istanbul: Memories and the City,” with further glimpses of the “forest of secret stairways” that is his home; here is the man who so loves books that he wrote a whole novel, “The New Life,” about a character whose life is turned around by a book, with essays on the writers who possess him. Here, too, is the author of the fearlessly topical Islamic novel “Snow,” who, two years ago, was brought to trial by his government after telling a Swiss newspaper it was taboo in Turkey to mention the local slaughter of a million Armenians and 30,000 Kurds, offering public statements on freedom of expression; and here, round every corner, is the whimsical, endlessly inventive juggler of possibilities writing pieces in the voice of the subjects of a painting, and, in one mischievous chapter, of what he calls “Meaning” itself.

Digging to America – Anne Tyler:

Tyler’s 17th novel is an intimate portrait of two Baltimore families, one Iranian-American, who meet in the summer of 1997 when both adopt baby girls from Korea. The families’ improbable friendship illuminates what it means to be an American and whether an immigrant can ever feel completely at home here. In the Iranian-born Maryam, the grandmother of one of the babies, Tyler shows us a woman caught between two cultures and two countries.

From the (online) papers to the blogs. One of my favorite bookbloggers Dovegrey Reader put up a post on a book that sounds very interesting: The World Through Blunted Sight by Patrick Trevor-Hope.

Written by a consultant opthalmologist [..] with a love of art, here is a fascinating study of how visual defects affected many painters, sculptors, poets and writers throughout history and was thus reflected in their work in a variety of ways.[...] None of it had ever occurred to me before and so every chapter a revelation.Short and long-sight would obviously have an impact on an artist’s work, astigmatism too very likely to distort the final image.Paintings re-photographed through correcting lenses suddenly look strangely correctly proportioned.[...]Patrick Trevor-Roper makes some interesting suggestions, was Constable colour blind? His fondness for autumn tints may indicate that he was. Was Impressionism the result of a generation of short-sighted artists? Interestingly how do colour blind writers describe colour accurately with such a limited palette available? Or perhaps they are just very vague about it?

David Grossman

Una nuova, e questa volta inaspettata dimostrazione di solidarietà, arriva ai coloni che un anno e mezzo fa furono fatti sgmobrare da Gaza. A schierarsi è l’ala intellettuale della sinistra israeliana. Un appello a favore dei coloni è stato infatti firmato da un nutrito gruppo di scrittori, tra i quali spiccano i nomi Amos Oz, A.B. Yehoshua, David Grossman, Yehoshua Sobol. E con loro anche alcuni esponenti della sinistra politica storica israeliana, come Yossi Sarid, Shulamit Alloni, Aryeh Eliav. Un fronte unico per accusare il governo di aver trascurato gli sfollati da Gaza e dalla Cisgiordania settentrionale. Dicono i firmatari: “Furono sgomberati per tutti noi. Eppure adesso sono abbandonati al loro destino in case prefabbricate temporanee. Fra di loro c’è disoccupazione, i vincoli sociali si allentano, la nostalgia per quanto hanno perduto brucia nella loro pelle e non hanno alcun posto di accoglienza .Guardiamo alle sofferenze dei nostri fratelli, soffriamo con loro e protestiamo”.