David Herman
A.B. Yehoshua and the Generation of the State
Summary
A. B. Yehoshua (1936–2022) was part of the so-called “Generation of the State,” which helped mould the new Israeli identity of the late 1950s and 1960s. He was born in Jerusalem to the fifth generation of a Sephardic Jewish family and was a hugely prolific writer, beginning with his first short stories published in the late 1950s and 14 novels in a span of almost 50 years.
David Herman
David Herman is a freelance writer based in London. Over the past 20 years he has written almost a thousand articles, essays, and reviews on Jewish history and literature for publications including the Jewish Chronicle, the Jewish Quarterly, Jewish Renaissance, the Guardian, the New Statesman, and Prospect. He has taught courses on Jewish culture for the London Jewish Cultural Centre and JW3. He is a regular contributor to Jewish Book Week, the Association of Jewish Refugees, and the Insiders/Outsiders Festival on the contribution of Jewish refugees to British culture.
Well, let me take these one by one, was he happily married? Yes, he was, he and his wife were happily married for many, many years until her death, she predeceased him by a few years. I met her also together with him, and she was a lovely, lovely person. Did he manage to earn a living from his writing? Yes, he was a very prolific author, but he also taught at the University of Haifa for many years, and that also helped make his living, helped him make his living. Did he retain a strong Zionist conviction? Yes, absolutely. He was a passionate, lifelong Zionist and yet I think became increasingly disillusioned towards the end of his life with what he saw as the moral corruption in Israel, of Israel. And as I said a moment ago, I would be very interested to know what he would’ve made of Netanyahu and of the current coalition government. I suspect he would, he only died two years ago, but I suspect he would not have been a great admirer.
Hmm. Well, the reason I focused on the four more recent novels that I mentioned is because I’m a big fan of all of them, particularly perhaps “Friendly Fire”. And “The Extra” is really interesting about the choice between Tel Aviv and Jerusalem and what they stand for as places in Israel or the two Israels that they stand for. And “A Woman in Jerusalem” is a very moving and fascinating story. They’re all very similar, I would say. So I don’t think it would matter terribly much which one of those three you started with. They’re all similar because they’re all about ordinary Israeli people and they’re all about Israel and contemporary present day Israel and what kind of society it is. So, and I think they all give a good introduction to his very plain style and also this fascinating idea that he had, that he inherited from Yehosua of hidden drawers, secret drawers, which is really at the heart I think of Yehosua’s writing. Agnan was a huge influence on him. And so I think any of those three novels would be a good place to start personally.