Celebrated Israeli author Amos Oz says he lives in a constant state of schizophrenia over his fiction and nonfiction.
“When I get very angry, I write an article or essay,” Oz said, in a telephone interview from Israel. “When I am in total agreement with myself, I make a speech or give an interview, telling my government what to do. Sometimes I tell it where to go altogether. Not that they listen.”
Oz will be speaking Monday evening at San Francisco’s Herbst Theatre about his 12th novel, “The Same Sea.” The event, part of the City Arts & Lectures Inc. series, is sponsored by the Koret Foundation.
The author of 18 books and countless essays has been a peace advocate as long as he’s been a writer. He has long held the belief that the only solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is the creation of a Palestinian state. He knows it not only in his analytical mind, he said, but in his bones.
“The fact that the Palestinians have lousy leadership, and now we both do, does not change the basic reality: that namely there are two different nations living in one small land and they cannot share it, they have to divide it.”
The opinion that used to be considered so controversial is now accepted by 70 to 80 percent of Israelis, Oz believes.
When asked how the Israeli-Palestinian equation has changed since Sept. 11, Oz voiced sentiments similar to those he expressed in a Sept. 14 opinion page piece in the New York Times.
“We were assuming that the 20th century would be followed by the 21st, and that the first millennium would be followed by the second, and instead it turns out that the 20th century is being followed by the 13th, and the second millennium is being followed by the first. We’re going back to the Middle Ages,” he said.
What Oz means is that that contrary to what many believe, the battle between America and Osama bin Laden cannot be characterized as Islam vs. modernity, or East vs. West.
Rather, it is between the “various kinds of fanatics, for whom the end — any end — justifies the means, and the rest of us, who regard life itself as a sacred value.”
Drawing similarities to the Israeli-Palestinian situation, he said, “It is a battle over minds and souls; it cannot be won by armies alone.”
While many writers say that conflict is crucial to the plot of a novel, Oz prefers to keep his political beliefs out of his fiction.
“I draw a very clear line between storytelling and essays,” he said. “I never smuggle into my novels any political messages or propaganda.”
Oz has said that “The Same Sea,” is the novel he’d like to be remembered for. Unlike his others, it is written in a kind of poetry, rather than prose. To write it in this manner was not so much an idea, he said, but rather a revelation that came to him while it was in progress.
Oz was in seclusion in a small village in Cypress at the time. “I was sweating over a rather conventional novel, with its cast of characters, plot and background. And at the end of every working day, out of solitude, I began making myself notes for the next working day, on little scraps of paper.”
These notes turned out to be “how it wants to be written, to sing and dance,” he said.
Oz has long written poetry but has never published it. He described himself as a frustrated musician, becoming a writer by default because he had no talent for his true passion.
“Next to writing music comes writing poetry, and only third comes writing prose,” he said. With “The Same Sea,” “I’ve moved one step up the ladder in the right direction.”
Now Oz has accomplished something he’s always wanted to do: “Erase the line between prose and poetry, between storytelling and music, between fiction and biography. This book is a conglomeration of all of those.”
This novel, which has become a best seller in Israel, took Oz five years to write, much longer than his other works. With its characters whose relationships defy the conventional, he calls it a “sexy book, incestuous in a way.”
When asked how much of his own life appears in his fiction, Oz said, “Every single line is autobiographical but not confessional, and they should not be confused. If I wrote about a love affair between Mother Teresa and the soccer player Maradona, it would be autobiographical and not confessional.
“It all comes from my experience and observation but is not necessarily a record of my life. It’s the life of imagination and fantasy and the life of my fears and wishes.”
In addition to the poetry format in “The Same Sea,” Oz uses another rather unconventional tactic: the author-as-character.
While he is not the protagonist, he makes an occasional appearance.
“Normally the author sits on a high chair like God Almighty and tells the story about characters he knows inside and out. This is a different ballgame. I am part of their lives and they are part of mine. I give them ideas or control what they do, but they interfere with my life and tell me how to live it.”
While he is at work on something new, Oz declined to talk about it, saying, “I am reluctant to expose my pregnancy to X-rays.”