To Jerusalem and Back (Penguin Modern Classics) - Softcover

Bellow, Saul

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0141188871 ISBN 13: 9780141188874

Publisher: Penguin Classics, 2008

Synopsis

In the mid-1970s, Saul Bellow visited Israel and To Jerusalem and Back is his account of his time there. Immersing himself in its landscape and culture, he records the opinions, passions and dreams of Israelis of varying viewpoints – from Prime Minister Rabin, novelist Amos Oz and the editor of an Arab-language newspaper to a kibbutznik escaped from the Warsaw ghetto and the barber at Bellow’s hotel. Through meditations steeped in history and literature he adds his own reflections on being Jewish in the twentieth century. Bellow’s exploration of a beautiful and troubled city is a powerful testament to the unique spirit and challenges of Israel, its history and its future.

About this title

Review:

Bellow evokes places, ideas, people on the edge of history, an inch from disaster, yet brimming with argument and words . An impassioned and thoughtful book. The New York Times Book Review
Essentially a plea for a greater understanding of the state of Israel by one of its most articulate admirers. The Times"

"Bellow evokes places, ideas, people...on the edge of history, an inch from disaster, yet brimming with argument and words.... An impassioned and thoughtful book." -The New York Times Book Review

"Essentially a plea for a greater understanding of the state of Israel by one of its most articulate admirers." -The Times

About the Author:

Saul Bellow was born in 1915 to Russian émigré parents. As a young child in Chicago, Bellow was raised on books - the Old Testament, Shakespeare, Tolstoy and Chekhov - and learned Hebrew and Yiddish. He set his heart on becoming a writer after reading Uncle Tom's Cabin, contrary to his mother's hopes that he would become a rabbi or a concert violinist. He was educated at the University of Chicago and North-Western University, graduating in Anthropology and Sociology; he then went on to work for the Encyclopaedia Britannica.

Bellow published his first novel, The Dangling Man, in 1944; this was followed, in 1947, by The Victim. In 1948 a Guggenheim Fellowship enabled Bellow to travel to Paris, where he wrote The Adventures of Augie March, published in 1953. Henderson The Rain King (1959) brought Bellow worldwide fame, and in 1964, his best-known novel, Herzog, was published and immediately lauded as a masterpiece, 'a well-nigh faultless novel' (New Yorker).

Saul Bellow's dazzling career as a novelist was celebrated during his lifetime with an unprecedented array of literary prizes and awards, including the Pulitzer Prize, three National Book Awards, and the Gold Medal for the Novel. In 1976 he was awarded a Nobel Prize 'for the human understanding and subtle analysis of contemporary culture that are combined in his work'.

Bellow's death in 2005 was met with tribute from writers and critics around the world, including James Wood, who praised 'the beauty of this writing, its music, its high lyricism, its firm but luxurious pleasure in language itself'.

About this edition

• Publisher: Penguin Classics
• Publication date: 2008
• ISBN 10: 0141188871
• ISBN 13: 9780141188874
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 176