The Same Sea Book

The Same Sea finds Amos Oz, one of Israel's finest living novelists, at the height of his literary powers. First published in Hebrew to wide acclaim, Nicholas de Lange's elegant translation of The Same Sea retains the complex mosaic of voices that make up Oz's novel, as it daringly hovers between prose and poetry. Both the plot and style of the book are encapsulated in its first lines: Not far from the sea, Mr Albert Danon lives in Amirim Street, alone. He is fond of olives and feta; a mild accountant, he lost his wife not long ago. Slowly, the connections unfold between the quietly grieving Albert, his dead wife Nadia, their absent son Enrico, and the two women in his life--Enrico's sensuous girlfriend Dita, and his widowed friend Bettine. The short, allusive chapters cut between prose and a loose, free verse, as the characters' paths are marked out and criss-crossed, as Oz skilfully moves from the confused, contemporary world of Enrico and Dita, and the elegiac past of Albert, Nadia and Bettine. At points Oz himself appears to offer solace and advice to his characters, as well as his readers. Offering hints as to the nature of the novel, he suggests "you could see it as a number of intersecting triangles", but that, ultimately, all the characters "are among shadows". Playful, beautifully written, and full of biblical and rabbinic allusions, The Same Sea is a consummate but also strangely elusive novel. --Jerry Brotton Read More