Amos Oz Quotes

The Hebrew writers who I feel should be more widely appreciated my own mentors, I suppose-are Micha Berdyczewski, Yosef Haim Brenner, and, of course, Shmuel Yosef Agnon. (HC: And on the world scene?) AO: That's too large an order. (HC: Well, whom of those you have read recently have you found impressive?) AO: The South Africans: Nadine Gordimer, J. M. Coetzee, and André Brink.

[T]ime and again, I mentioned to our soldiers, to our reservists that there is no point in hating every Arab for being an Arab, that many of them are as much victims of this fanaticism and ruthlessness as we are or perhaps more so because they suffer more, and they will suffer more.

I don't believe in magnanimous dreams coming true. Every fulfillment of a dream or of an ambition is bound, destined, to be partial, especially because Israel was founded on such a shaky coalition of conflicting and contradicting dreams, master plans and visions. There was no way they all could come true. The other reason, of course, is that since its creation and even since earlier, Israel has been stuck with a nasty, violent conflict with its Arab neighbors. And I don't think an atmosphere of a constant, violent, hateful conflict is the right atmosphere to create the most egalitarian and just society in the world.

We regard Judaism as a civilization, not just as a religion. I think there are many, many ways to be a Jew. And one of those ways to be a Jew is to be a nonreligious Jew. The heritage contains, first and foremost, books, texts, spiritual creativity. And religion is only one of the components of this magnificent heritage.

If I had to squeeze my wisdom into one word, I would say: "Listen, you don't necessarily have to agree to what you listen to, but listen very carefully. Listen even to voices which you regard as dangerous, abhorrent, terrible, monstrous." Even if your conclusion is going to be, "I have to rebuff those voices, I have to fight them, I regard them as a threat to the future of my people or the future of my family," you still would be wise to listen very carefully to what those other people are saying before you form your position or even your tactic of combating them or struggling against them. Listen with a certain degree of curiosity. Even try to ask yourself: What would it be that would have made me one of them? A different background? A different family? A different upbringing? Different values? A different environment? Could I be one of those? I think this is a very simple practice, but it’s a helpful one.

Israel is a dream come true, and as a dream come true it is flawed, very flawed, and sometimes dangerously flawed or painfully flawed. But this is in the nature of dreams, not necessarily in the nature of Israel.

The minute we leave south Lebanon we will have to erase the word Hezbollah from our vocabulary, because the whole idea of the State of Israel versus Hezbollah was sheer folly from the outset. It most certainly no longer will be relevant when Israel returns to her internationally recognized northern border.

Judaism to me is a culture - first and foremost, the Hebrew language, which I think is the crux of the heritage, a long line of books, creations, certain sensibilities which I identify as Jewish sensibilities, although they are not exclusively Jewish, humor and skepticism, certain anarchism, certain lack of confidence in any regime or government whatsoever, certain utopian ambitions about world reforming. All of these, I identify - this and more, I identify as Jewish heritage, Jewish sensibilities. And all of those are alive and kicking - sometimes kicking too hard - outside the realm of synagogue.

[M]uch like Israel itself, this is a novel about great dreams, about great expectations, about bigger-than-life visions and, indeed, about the morning after and the sad realization that every dream come true is bound to be flawed by coming true. (about Black Box)

To me, reconciliation means a political settlement. If I had to entitle my vision vis a vis the Arabs in general and the Palestinians in particular, I would say make peace not love. The name of the game for Israelis and for Palestinians, as I see it, is a fair and decent and painful divorce rather than a honeymoon bed together. I think Israelis and Palestinians should separate land and assets, divide the land between the two nations and live in peace like two ex people rather than try to reconcile in the way of living together. The conflict between the Israelis and Palestinians is not a family dispute. It's a dispute between two families.

The [political] left are people with an imagination and the right are those without an imagination.

[H]aving fought a war, you will never be the same human being. Having shot at people, having been shot at by total strangers, you will never be the same again.

Very often, fanaticism begins at home. It begins inside the family. It begins with the urge to change our kin, to change our beloved ones for their own good because we think we know better than them what is good and what is bad for them, what is right and what is wrong in their thinking. The urge to change other people contains sometimes a certain fanatic potential.

I'd fight again and again if it would be a matter of life and death for the nation. I would not fight, though, for any other cause. I would not fight for resources. I'd not fight for interests. When it comes to life and death, I have always believed that there is one thing in this world which is more ugly, more sordid, than using violence. And this thing is giving in to violence. In this respect, I am a peacenik not a pacifist. And the Israeli Peace Now movement is clearly not a Make Love Not War movement - not one of those.

[I]n the 1940s, Israel was still a dream, a vision and a blueprint. They talked about the impending creation of a Jewish state in messianic terms. This state, which is about to be born, will be pure, angelic, idyllic. It will hold world records in high job morality, gold medal in good behavior, in treating minorities, in social justice. It will be both biblical and modern, both very Jewish and very secular and very democratic and very socialistic. It will be more everything than anyone. But this, of course, was a dream, a fantasy, a vision. And then came the morning after. (And?) OZ: Well, the morning after is a disappointment by definition. I maintain that the only way to keep a dream - not only a Zionist dream, any dream, a sexual dream, a sexual fantasy. The only way to keep any dream or fantasy intact and rosy and perfect and flawless is never to try to live it out. Israel is a dream come true. As such, it is destined to be a disappointment to some extent. And I accept it philosophically.