Novelist, born in Jerusalem, Israel. He studied at the Hebrew University there and at Oxford, served in the Israeli army, and worked part-time as a schoolteacher as well as a writer. His novels describe the tensions of life in modern Israel, and include (trans titles) Elsewhere, Perhaps (1966), My Michael (1968), In the Land of Israel (1982), and Don't Call it Night (1995). Later books include Panther in the Basement (1997) and The Same Sea (2001). A Tale of Love and Darkness, chronicling his early life, was published in 2004. Among his awards are the Israel Prize for Literature in 1998 and the 2005 Goethe cultural prize for his life's work.
Amos Oz (Hebrew: עמוס עוז;
Life
He was born in Jerusalem, where he grew up at No.
Many of Klausner's family members were right-wing Revisionist Zionists. His relative Joseph Klausner was the Herut party candidate for the presidency against Chaim Weizmann and was chair of the Hebrew literary society at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem.
He and his family were distant from religion, disdaining its irrationality. The alternative was the socialistic school affiliated with the labor movement, to which his family was decidedly opposed in their political values.
His mother committed suicide when he was twelve, causing him repercussions that he would explore in his memoir A Tale of Love and Darkness. At this time he changed his surname to "Oz", Hebrew for "strength". [Remnick, 2004, p.91] He remained living and working on the kibbutz until he and his wife Nily moved to Arad in 1986 on account of his son Daniel's asthma; however, as his writing career flowered he was allowed to gradually decrease his time devoted to normal kibbutz work: the royalties from his writing produced sufficient income for the kibbutz to justify this. [Remnick, 2004, p.92]
Like most Jewish Israelis, he served in the Israeli Defense Forces. [Remnick, 2004, p.92]
After Nahal, Oz studied philosophy and Hebrew literature at the Hebrew University. Except for some short articles in the kibbutz newsletter and the newspaper Davar, he didn't publish anything until the age of 22, when he began to publish books. He began to write incessantly, publishing an average of one book per year on the Labor Party press, Am Oved.
Oz left Am Oved despite his political affiliation.
His oldest daughter, Fania, teaches history at Haifa University.
Oz was awarded his country’s most prestigious prize: the Israel Prize for Literature in 1998, the fiftieth anniversary year of Israel’s independence. In 2005, he was awarded the Goethe Prize from the city of Frankfurt, Germany, a prestigious prize which was awarded in the past to the likes of Sigmund Freud and Thomas Mann for his life's work.
He has written 18 books in Hebrew, and about 450 articles and essays.
Works
Besides his fiction, Oz regularly publishes essays on the subjects of politics, literature, and peace. He has written extensively for the Israeli Labor newspaper Davar and (since the demise of Davar in the 1990s) for Yedioth Ahronoth.
Amos Oz is one of the writers whose work literary researchers study from a fundamental approach. Amos Oz has been considered in recent years one of the serious candidates to receive the Nobel Prize in Literature.
In his works Amos Oz tends to present protagonists in a realistic light with a light ironic touch.
In his 2004 essay "How to Cure a Fanatic" (later the title essay of a 2006 collection), Oz argues that the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is not a war of religion or cultures or traditions, but rather a real estate dispute--one that will be resolved not by greater understanding, but by painful compromise.
His books other than novels include:
In the Land of Israel (essays on political issues) Israel, Palestine and Peace: Essays Under This Blazing Light A Tale of Love and Darkness (2003) How to Cure a Fanatic (2006)He has written the following novels.
Where the Jackals Howl (1965) Elsewhere, Perhaps (1966) My Michael (1968) Unto Death (1971) Touch the Water, Touch the Wind (1973) The Hill of Evil Counsel (1976) Soumchi (1978) A Perfect Peace (1982) Black Box (1987) To Know a Woman (1989) Fima (1991) Don't Call It Night (1994) A Panther in the Basement (1995) The Same Sea (1999) A Tale of Love and Darkness (2003) Suddenly in the Depth of the Forest (A Fable for all ages) (2005)Politics
Amos Oz is among the most influential and well regarded intellectuals in Israel.
Oz's positions are notably dovish in the political sphere and social-democratic in the socio-economic sphere. Oz was one of the first Israelis to advocate a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict after the Six-Day War. Unlike some others in the Israeli peace movement, he does not oppose the construction of an Israeli West Bank barrier, but believes that it should be roughly along the Green Line, the pre-1967 border. [Remnick, 2004, p.93]
He opposed settlement activity from the very first and was among the first to praise the Oslo Accords and talks with the PLO.
A couple of quotes that express his positions well:
"Two Palestinian-Israeli wars have erupted in this region. (September 6, 2002)For many years Oz was identified with the Israeli Labor Party and was close to its leader Shimon Peres. When Shimon Peres was retiring from the leadership of the Israeli Labour Party, he is said to have named Oz as one of three possible successors, along with Ehud Barak (later prime minister) and Shlomo Ben-Ami (later Barak's foreign minister). [Remnick, 2004, p.92]
In the 90s Oz withdrew his support from Labor and went left to Meretz, where he had good, close connections with the leader, Shulamit Aloni. In the elections to the sixteenth Knesset that took place in 2003, Oz appeared in the Meretz television campaign, calling upon the public to vote for Meretz.
In July 2006, Oz supported the Israeli army in its war with Lebanon, writing in the Los Angeles Times "Many times in the past, the Israeli peace movement has criticized Israeli military operations. This time, the battle is not over Israeli expansion and colonization. There are no territorial claims from either side… The Israeli peace movement should support Israel's attempt at self-defense, pure and simple, as long as this operation targets mostly Hezbollah and spares, as much as possible, the lives of Lebanese civilians (not an easy task, as Hezbollah missile launchers are too often using Lebanese civilians as human sandbags)"
Acknowledgement
Much of the text of this article was translated from the article עמוס עוז (Amos Oz;
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