Price £8.99
Format Paperback
Published September 2010
Length 464 pages
ISBN 9781905559190
ISBN 9781905559251 (ebook)
Click to order
Click to order
Friendly Fire
A.B. Yehoshua
Translated from Hebrew by Stuart Schoffman
A husband and wife spend a week apart over the Hanukkah holiday: Daniela visits her recently widowed brother-in-law who has insisted on staying in Africa on an obscure archaeological dig. She wants to revive early memories of her sister with him but, in ways she cannot begin to understand, he has been left wounded and raging following an earlier tragedy – a death by friendly fire. Amotz Ya’ari stays behind in Israel, rushing between his elevator engineering company, his son’s family, his grandchildren and his father.
Life in the Ya’ari family is full, complicated and often humorous, but beyond it lies a fragile society deeply uneasy with itself and badly scarred, with each family harbouring its own ghosts. Ever-creative, A.B. Yehoshua’s short, interwoven chapters create a duet like narrative which penetrates deeply – too deeply for some – into human relationships. He taps into the psyche of the reader as he taps into the psyche of his country, and we emerge altered by what we have read.
A.B. Yehoshua
Born in Jerusalem in 1936, A.B. Yehoshua was the author of twelve novels, a collection of short stories, and several plays and volumes of essays. He has won prizes worldwide and his work has been translated into twenty-eight languages and adapted for film and opera. An outspoken critic of both Israeli and Palestinian policies, he continued to speak about and search for solutions to the Israeli–Palestinian conflict. Yehoshua died in June 2022, aged 85.
Visit our Remembering A.B. Yehoshua page to read some of the countless tributes and obituaries that have been written to celebrate Yehoshua’s incredible life and career.
About Stuart Schoffman
Stuart Schoffman was a writer, translator, educator, historian, screenwriter, humourist, a shrewd observer of people and a fount of knowledge which we joyfully shared for many years. Stuart died in November 2021 after battling a serious illness. He enriched our lives personally and professionally and we shall miss him deeply
News
May 2012
A.B. Yehoshua's play 'Can Two Walk Together?' is performed at the Royal Society of Medicine, London. The play depicts a debate between the two Zionist leaders Ben-Gurion and Jabontinsky as they meet to discuss the character of the future Jewish State. Read The Independent's review of the play here.
November 2011
Limmud Festival 2011. A.B. Yehoshua will appear for two talks - "Is there any continuation of the Zionist Revolution?" & "Literature and Culture", in conversation with Nicholas de Lange.
February 2011
Ian McEwan celebrates A.B. Yehosua in his acceptance speech for the 2011 Jerusalem Prize:
'He singled out three celebrated Israeli authors – Amos Oz, AB Yehoshua and David Grossman – as "writers who love their country, and made sacrifices for it and have been troubled by the directions it has taken".
They had opposed the settlements, he said, and had become the country's "conscience, memory and above all hope".'
Quoted from The Guardian. Read their full report here.
October 2010
Friendly Fire shortlisted for the Independent Foreign Fiction Prize