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June 19, 2006
Amos Oz, Peering Into Germany
A long article in the English edition of Haaretz looks at the new book, "The Slopes of the Volcano," by Israeli writer Amos Oz. Its essays deal with Oz's views on Germany and how they evolved. The article, "Through the Other End of the Binoculars," says,
"A writer is a man who gets up in the morning, drinks a cup of coffee, sits down at his desk, and asks himself: What if I were him?" writes Oz. That is an analytical approach of the most imaginative and fruitful kind, the historian is bound to agree.Oz employs this counterfactual approach over and over in his scrutiny of Germany. "What would I do? What would it feel like if I had been born and educated on the side of the persecutors?" he asked after the Eichmann trial - a question he felt was late in coming in this country. "What would I have done if I had been a 7- or 10-year-old German boy ... when the Nazis came to power?" he wondered after reading Lenz's book "Deutschstunde" ("A Lesson in German"). "Who knows if I wouldn't have been the village policeman in that novel (the quintessential conformist)." There is a lot packed into that sentence.
Read the whole thing, along with the illuminating feedback from readers.
Van | 06/19/06 at 12:06 PM | Categories: Doing Jewish
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