Amos oz autobiography of a flea market

  • AMOS OZ (1939–2018) was born in Jerusalem.
  • This is the third novel by the lavishly gifted Israeli writer Amos Oz, and it offers a profusion of delightful passages couched in unfailingly lovely language.
  • It was then that I came upon, “Panther in the Basement,” a short novel by Israeli writer Amos Oz, who was lionized for his prolific contribution.

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    November 24, 1974

    Touch the Water Touch the Wind
    By ALAN FRIEDMAN
    TOUCH THE WATER. TOUCH THE WIND.
    By Amos Oz.
    onceived in poetic license and dedicated to the proposition that all characters are created equal, "Touch the Water Touch the Wind" lightly touches everything under the sun as it flows and turns from Poland to Israel, from Heidegger to Stalin, from mathematics to gossip, from espionage to metaphysics, from infernal Nazism to international Communism to eternal love. This is the third novel by the lavishly gifted Israeli writer Amos Oz, and it offers a profusion of delightful passages couched in unfailingly lovely language. Inadvertently, it also offers an elegant proof for the theorem that a novel as a whole can be less than the sum of its parts.

    Elisha Pomeranz, a provincial Jewish schoolmaster, flees from invading Nazis by the magic of self- levitation: a symbolic Flight to the Promised Land. Descending, he makes his way by land and sea to Israel

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    Like thescrap collector in one of his stories, Omer Friedlander’s prose sifts through the junk of this world to find those whimsical elements that are otherwise overlooked. Rich in imagery and sprinkled with humor and spice, The Man Who Sold Air in the Holy Landconjures något privat eller personligt and inventive portraits of Israeli life. Even though Friedlander fryst vatten only 27, his debut short story collection glides through imagination, reality, and history with the maturity and elegance of a Jewish grandmother’s Shabbat lunch. Seeing right through the small talk around the steaming pot of cholent, Friedlander brings the unseen to the fore, paying tribute to the crumbs on the floor, the twitch of an uncle’s mustache, and the two cousins playing footsie underneath the table, who will forever associate brisket and beans with a kick in the shins.

    I first became acquainted with Friedlander’s work during a jazz performance held in a Tel Avivi backyard. After the first set, the upright bassist was approa

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    Amos Oz: Writer, Activist, Icon 9780300274387

    Table of contents :
    Contents
    Acknowledgments
    Note to the Reader
    1. Childhood
    2. The Kibbutz, Romance, and the Army
    3. The Fiction Writer
    4. Friends, Family, and Performance
    5. The Activist
    6. Taking Stock
    Epilogue
    Index
    About the Author

    Citation preview

    Amos Oz

    Amos Oz Writer, Activist, Icon R O B E RT A LT E R

    New Haven and London

    Jewish Lives® fryst vatten a registered trademark of the Leon D. Black Foundation. Copyright © 2023 by Robert Alter. All rights reserved. This book may not be reproduced, in whole or in part, including illustrations, in any form (beyond that copying permitted by Sections 107 and 108 of the U.S. Copyright Law and except by reviewers for the public press), without written permission from the publishers. All quotations from books and lectures by Amos Oz in Hebrew are translated by the author and quoted or reproduced by permission: copyrights by Nily Oz, various dates. Yale University Press books may be pur

  • amos oz autobiography of a flea market