David Grossman

The Israeli writer David Grossman is of of my favourite authors. His work is so delicate, full of ideas and beautiful stories, I read his novels and essays over and over again. From the first book I ever read The Yellow Wind to his latest masterpiece To the End of the Land. Humanity plays an important rol in his work, more important than the political situation in his country. Although he has a lot to say about that, it's never on the foreground in his novels. I 'm lucky to know him personally, and it's always a great pleasure to meet him and talk.

(photo from De Papieren Man)

From an interview for The Paris Review in 2007 with Jonathan Shainin there's this extract from their long conversation:

S: Yet in Death as a Way of Life you say: "I don't belong to those who believe that the Holocaust was a specifically Jewish event."
G: I don't think one can separate the Jewishness from the Shoah, but it's an event that's relevant for all humanity. Every human being should ask himself several questions regarding the Shoah. One of them is - in the face of such total arbitrariness- how can I maintain my uniqueness as a human being? What in me can not be eradicated? In Be My Knife I call this idea the luz, the kernel. Luz is a word from the Talmud. It's the smallest bone in your backbone, which can not be eradicated. All your essence is preserved in it, and from that you will be recreated in resurrection. Sometimes I do a little exercise: I ask people to close their eyes and for one minute to think what would be their luz. The pupil of the eye of their personality. I get interesting answers.
S: What is your luz?
G: I guess it has to do with the urge to create.

What a great thinker David Grossman is. A very moving contribution to questioning what's important regarding humanity. Of all times, from the Talmud to the Twenty-First century.