Panther in the Basement
Eric Feinblatt (Author photograph) New York: Harcourt Brace & Company, 1995. First edition [stated], Third printing [stated]. Hardcover. The format is approximately 5.5 inches by 8.5 inches. [8], 147, [5] pages. Signed by the author with comment ("Shalom") in the fep. From a great and true voice of our time (Washington Post Book World), comes this story of Proffy, a twelve-year-old living in Palestine in 1947. When Proffy befriends a member of the occupying British forces who shares his love of language and the Bible, he is accused of treason by his friends and learns the true nature of loyalty and betrayal. Amos Oz (born Amos Klausner; 4 May 1939 – 28 December 2018) was an Israeli writer, novelist, journalist, and intellectual. He was also a professor of Hebrew literature at Ben-Gurion University of the Negev. From 1967 onwards, Oz was a prominent advocate of a two-state solution to the Israeli–Palestinian conflict. He was the author of 40 books, including novels, short story collections, children's books, and essays, and his work has been published in 45 languages, more than that of any other Israeli writer. He was the recipient of many honors and awards, among them the Friedenspreis des Deutschen Buchhandels, the Legion of Honour of France, the Israel Prize, the Goethe Prize, the Prince of Asturias Award in Literature, the Heinrich Heine Prize, and the Franz Kafka Prize. Oz is regarded as one of "Israel's most prolific writers and respected intellectuals", as The New York Times worded it in an obituary. Derived from a Kirkus review: A wonderful novel from the increasingly acclaimed Israeli author. This time, Oz offers the first-person narrative of an imaginative and intelligent 12-year- old boy nicknamed Proffy (short for ``Professor''), living just outside Jerusalem in 1947, the final year of the British ``mandate'' (occupation). Determined to grow up to fight for his people's independence, Proffy joins two comrades in forming a make- believe underground resistance movement he calls FOD (``Freedom or Death''). He imagines himself a ``panther in the basement,'' silently crouching and biding his time awaiting an opportunity to ``pounce on'' the hated British. But while out one night beyond curfew, Proffy is apprehended by the unprepossessing Sergeant Dunlop, a clumsy British policeman who turns out to be sympathetic toward Jews and deeply enamored of their culture. He and Proffy meet secretly in a local cafe, exchanging Hebrew and English lessons, and bringing Proffy to a paradoxical reevaluation of himself as ``a young Hebrew Underground fighter, whose life is devoted to driving out the foreign oppressor, but whose soul is bound up with his. . . .'' This amazingly compact novel features several vivid supporting characters (including Proffy's severe scholarly father and forthright mother, his judgmental friends Ben Hur and Chita, and Ben Hur's grownup sister Yardena, a woman wise beyond her years) and such marvelous set-pieces as Proffy's long rhapsodic description of the books in his father's study, and a moving climactic moment of understanding between father and son on the eve of the formation of the state of Israel. Oz expertly blends together an ingenious allegory of the Israeli resistance movement, a shimmering portrait of life in postwar Jerusalem and environs, and an unforgettable characterization of its sentient young hero- -who's thoroughly believable both as a confused preadolescent and as the mature writer looking backward on his, and his country's, youth from the vantage point of middle age. Another triumph, and further evidence of Oz's increasing claim to serious Nobel Prize consideration. Condition: Very good / Very good.
Keywords: Israel, Jews, Palestine, British Mandate, Underground Movement, Resistance Movement, Yardena, Foreign Oppressor, British Occupation, Independence Movement, Jerusalem
ISBN: 0151002878
[Book #85828]
Price: $125.00