A. B. Yehoshua

Infobox Writer
name = A. B. Yehoshua

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imagesize =
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pseudonym =
birthname = Abraham Boolie Yehoshua
birthdate = birth year and age|1936
birthplace = Jerusalem
deathdate =
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occupation = novelist, essayist, short story writer, Playwright
nationality = Israel
period =
genre =
subject =
movement = Israeli "New Wave"
notableworks = "Mr. Mani"
awards = awd|Los Angeles Times Book Prize|2006|A Woman in Jerusalem
influences = Franz Kafka, William Faulkner, Shmuel Yosef Agnon
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website =

Abraham "Boolie" Yehoshua (born in Jerusalem in 1936) is an Israeli novelist, essayist, and playwright, known publicly as A. B. Yehoshua, and familiarly as "Boolie".

Biography

Yehoshua was born in the fifth Jerusalem generation of a Sephardi Jewish family. After studying literature and philosophy at the Hebrew University, he began a teaching career. From 1963 to 1967 he resided and taught in Paris. In 1972 he joined the faculty of the University of Haifa. [ Feld, Ross. " [http://www.bostonreview.net/BR25.3/feld.html Restless Souls] : The novels of Israeli writer A. B. Yehoshua create their own diaspora." "Boston Review", 2000. ]

From the end of his military service, he began to publish fiction. He became a notable figure in the "new wave" generation of Israeli writers. They contrasted with the social concern of earlier writers by focusing on the individual and interpersonal. Yehoshua names Franz Kafka, Shmuel Yosef Agnon, and William Faulkner as formative influences [ Wiley, David. " [http://www.mndaily.com/ae/Print/1997/20/st/wwyeho.html Talkin' 'bout his generation] : Israeli writer A.B. Yehoshua on the waning art of the democratic novel." "Minnesota Daily", 1997. ] . Harold Bloom has compared Yehoshua to Faulkner in an article appearing in the "New York Times" [Bloom, Harold. "Domestic Derangements; A Late Divorce, By A.B. Yehoshua Translated by Hillel Halkin," "New York Times", February 19, 1984. ] and also mentions him in his book "The Western Canon" [ Bloom, Harold. "The Western Canon" New York: Harcourt Brace & Co, 1994. 532.] .

Yehoshua attended the signing of the Geneva Accord. He presents his political views in essays and interviews.

Currently he is a senior lecturer in literature at the University of Haifa, in the city where he resides. He has won the Bialik Prize and the Israel Prize for literature. His novel "A Woman in Jerusalem" won the 2006 Los Angeles Times Book Prize.

Controversy

Some of his actions and statements are controversial (e.g. quotes below).

Quotes

".... [Diaspora Jews] change [their] nationalities like jackets. Once they were Polish and Russian; now they are British and American. One day they could choose to be Chinese or Singaporean...For me, Avraham Yehoshua, there is no alternative... I cannot keep my identity outside Israel. [Being] Israeli is my skin, not my jacket. [from a speech delivered at the opening panel of the centennial celebration of the American Jewish Committee. [http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1145961275054&pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FShowFull Jerusalem Post Article] , [http://www.ajn.com.au/news/news.asp?pgID=603 AJN Article] ]

"The Palestinians are in a situation of insanity reminiscent of the insanity of the German people in the Nazi period. The Palestinians are not the first people that the Jewish people has driven insane."

Subsequent clarification by Yehoshua:"I ask myself a question that must be asked: What brought the Germans and what is bringing the Palestinians to such hatred of us? … We have a tough history. We came here out of a Jewish experience, and the settlements are messing it up." [A. B. Yehoshua at an academic conference, Jerusalem Post, June 21, 2002
http://www.jpost.com/NASApp/cs/ContentServer?pagename=JPost/A/JPArticle/Full&cid=1023716529742]

"Diaspora Judaism is masturbation," Yehoshua told editors and reporters at "The Jerusalem Post". "Here," meaning, in Israel, he said, "it is the real thing." [http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?pagename=JPost/A/JPArticle/ShowFull&cid=1047531932327]

Works published in English

Novels

* "Early in the Summer of 1970" [Bi-Thilat Kayitz, 1970, 1972] . Garden City N.Y., Doubleday, 1977. London, Heinemann, 1980. New York, Berkley Publishing, 1981. London, Fontana Paperbacks, 1990. ISBN 0385025904
* "Three Days and a Child" [Shlosha Yamim Ve-Yeled, 1975] . Garden City N.Y., Doubleday, 1970. London, Peter Owen, 1971. ISBN 0720601614
* "The Lover" [Ha-Me'ahev, 1977] . Garden City N.Y., Doubleday, 1978 (translated by Philip Simpson). Dutton, 1985. Harvest/HBJ, 1993. ISBN 0156539128
* "A Late Divorce" [Gerushim Meuharim, 1982] . London, Harvill Press, 1984. Garden City N.Y., Doubleday, 1984. London, Sphere/Abacus Books, 1985. New York, Dutton, 1985. San Diego, Harcourt Brace, 1993. ISBN 0156494477
* "Five Seasons" [Molcho, 1987] . New York, Doubleday, 1989. New York, Dutton Obelisk, 1989. London, Collins, 1989. Harmondsworth, Penguin Books, 1990. London, Fontana, 1990. ISBN 1870015940
* "Mr. Mani" [Mar Manni, 1990] . New York, Doubleday, 1992. London, Collins, 1992. London, Peter Halban, 1993. San Diego, Harvest/HBJ, 1993. London, Phoenix/Orion Books, 1994. ISBN 1857991850
* "Open Heart" [Ha-Shiv`a Me-Hodu (The Return from India), 1994] . Garden City N.Y., Doubleday, 1995. London, Peter Halban, 1996. San Diego, Harvest/HBJ, 1997. ISBN 0156004844
* "A Journey to the End of the Millennium" [Masah El Sof Ha-Elef, 1997] . New York, Doubleday & Co., 1999. London, Peter Halban, 1999. ISBN 0156011166
* "The Liberated Bride" [Ha-Kala Ha-Meshachreret, 2001] . London, Peter Halban, 2004. ISBN 0156030160
* "A Woman in Jerusalem" [Shlihuto Shel Ha-memouneh Al Mashabei Enosh (The Human Resources Supervisor's Mission), 2004] . London, Halban Publishers, 2006. ISBN 1870015983. New York, Harcourt, 2006. ISBN 0151012261

hort Stories

* "The Continuing Silence of a Poet". London, Peter Halban, 1988. London, Fontana Paperbacks, 1990. London, New York, Penguin, 1991. Syracuse, N.Y., Syracuse University Press, 1998. ISBN 0815605595

Essays

* "Israel". London, Collins, 1988. New York, Harper & Row, 1988. Jerusalem, Steimatzky/Collins Harvill, 1988.
* "Between Right and Right" [Bein Zechut Le-Zechut, 1980] . Garden City N.Y., Doubleday, 1981. ISBN 0385170351
* "The Terrible Power of a Minor Guilt" [Kocha Ha-Nora Shel Ashma Ktana, 1998] . New York, Syracuse University Press, 2000. ISBN 0815606567
* "An Attempt to Identify the Root Cause of Antisemitism". Azure Spring 5768/2008, No. 32. http://www.azure.org.il/magazine/magazine.asp?ID=418

Plays

* "A Night in May" [Layla Be-May, 1975] . Tel Aviv, Institute for the Translation of Hebrew Literature, 1974.
* "Possessions" [Hafatzim, 1986] . Portsmouth, Heinemann, 1993.

Footnotes

Critical studies (since 2000)

Journal articles

#Gershon Shaked Interviews A. B. Yehoshua By: Shaked, Gershon; "Modern Hebrew Literature", 2006 Fall; 3: 157-69.
#A Haifa Life: The Israeli Novelist Talks about Ducking into His Safe Room, Competition among His Writer Friends and Trying to Stay Optimistic about Peace in the Middle East By: Solomon, Deborah; "New York Times Magazine," 2006 July 30; 13.
#In the Back Yard of Agnon's House: Between "The Liberated Bride" by A. B. Yehoshua and S. Y. Agnon By: Ben-Dov, Nitza; "Hebrew Studies: A Journal Devoted to Hebrew Language and Literature," 2006; 47: 237-51.
#Semantic Parameters of Vision Words in Hebrew and English By: Myhill, John; "Languages in Contrast: International Journal for Contrastive Linguistics," 2006; 6 (2): 229-60.
#Talking with A. B. Yehoshua By: Naves, Elaine Kalman; "Queen's Quarterly," 2005 Spring; 112 (1): 76-86.
#The Silence of the Historian and the Ingenuity of the Storyteller: Rabbi Amnon of Mayence and Esther Minna of Worms By: Yuval, Israel Jacob; "Common Knowledge," 2003 Spring; 9 (2): 228-40.
#Sexuality, Confrontation and Religiosity: The Aesthetics of Israeli Society in "The Lover" of A. B. Yehoshua By: Devir, Nathan P.; "Rivista di Letterature Moderne e Comparate," 2002 Apr-June; 55 (2): 163-81.
#The Plot of Suicide in A. B. Yehoshua and Leo Tolstoy By: Horn, Bernard; "European Legacy: Toward New Paradigms," 2001 Oct; 6 (5): 633-38.
#The Originary Scene, Sacrifice, and the Politics of Normalization in A. B. Yehoshua's "Mr. Mani" By: Katz, Adam; "Anthropoetics: The Electronic Journal of Generative Anthropology," 2001 Fall-2002 Winter; 7 (2): 9 paragraphs.

Book articles

#Not Quite Holocaust Fiction: A. B. Yehoshua's "Mr. Mani" and W. G. Sebald's "The Emigrants" By: Newton, Adam Zachary. IN: Hirsch and Kacandes, "Teaching the Representation of the Holocaust." New York, NY: Modern Language Association of America; 2004. pp. 422-30
#Shading the Truth: A. B. Yehoshua's 'Facing the Forests' By: Morahg, Gilead. IN: Cutter and Jacobson, "History and Literature: New Readings of Jewish Texts in Honor of Arnold J. Band." Providence, RI: Program in Judaic Studies, Brown University; 2002. pp. 409-18
#Between Genesis and Sophocles: Biblical Psychopolitics in A. B. Yehoshua's "Mr. Mani" By: Feldman, Yael S.. IN: Cutter and Jacobson, "History and Literature: New Readings of Jewish Texts in Honor of Arnold J. Band." Providence, RI: Program in Judaic Studies, Brown University; 2002. pp. 451-64

External links

* [http://www.ithl.org.il/author_info.asp?id=286 Abraham B. Yehoshua Institute for Translation of Hebrew Literature] Bio and list of works
* [http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/biography/yehoshua.html Israel Ministry of Foreign Affairs] short bio + links to books
* [http://www.jafi.org.il/education/100/people/BIOS/ab.html The Jewish Agency for Israel] Short bio
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