I saw a brief interview with Charlie Rose and Doris Lessing who just was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature. She is 88 and I found her alert, intelligent and delightful. It occurred to me that I've never read anything by her and so went to amazon. Interestingly, I got mixed feelings on the reviews of her works,specifically THE CLEFTS, a mythic novel of a society that got its beginnings under a matriachy. Has anyone read any of her books?
The most engaging book that I'm currently reading is by Chaim Potok, THE CHOSEN, a coming of age story about two 15-year old boys, one the son of a Hasidim rabbi who is expected to succeed his father but who wants to be a psychologist and the other, the product of a reformed rabbi who wants to be a rabbi but whose father wants him to be a mathematician. Both boys are scholars, who meet while competing against one another in a neighborhood baseball game where the Hasidim hits the ball directly at the other's head almost knocking out his eye. They ultimately become the best of friends when the Hasidim visits the other in the hospital and find they have more in common than not. There is an enmity between the two groups akin to the light-skin/black-skin dichotomy or the sunni/shia schism.
It takes place in Brooklyn and depicts alot of Jewish culture. One thing that particularly struck me was the vehemance of the Hasidic, who is a sixth generation leader of his people, regarding the establishment of Israel. He is positively against it and zionism. I remember as a child my father railing against the same thing. He was not anti-Jewish but anti-zionist. It was surprising to me to read a book by a jew writing about jews who depicts that same thought. The book is not new, but reading it today in the light of dispensation, Christian Zionisim and the state of Israel is interesting.
Anybody reading anything interesting these days?
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that's one of the great things about summer: reading and the fact that i slow down enough to do it. these are the books that i have piled up near my bed (one day i hope to have enough attention to read them).
dreams for my father by barack obama
love by toni morrisom
pronoia by rob brezsney
tale of love and darkness by amos oz. a memoir framed by the birth of a nation -- israel.
i am infinitely fascinated by jewish and other ethnic stories.
last year pam and i went to to a talk of nobel literature laureates: toni morrison, wole soyinka, nadine gordimer and derek walcott. it was an amazing experience listening to these master artists speak and read their work.
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