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Fiction. Literature. Historical Fiction. HTML:�Passionate summary of the inhuman treatment of the Jewish people in Europe, of the exodus in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries to Palestine, and of the triumphant founding of the new Israel.��The New York Times Exodus is an international publishing phenomenon�the towering novel of the twentieth century's most dramatic geopolitical event. Leon Uris magnificently portrays the birth of a new nation in the midst of enemies�the beginning of an earthshaking struggle for power. Here is the tale that swept the world with its fury: the story of an American nurse, an Israeli freedom fighter caught up in a glorious, heartbreaking, triumphant era. Here is Exodus�one of the great bestselling novels of all time.… (more)
User reviews
Engrossing after even the first few pages, Exodus is, of course, the story of the creation of the State of Israel. Picking up not long after World War II ends, with the displaced Jews of Europe still living in refugee camps, their homes long gone or stolen, they are simply looking for a place to live and call their own. With the British cracking down on emigration to Palestine, those Jews wishing to make the trek must rely on luck or skill or guile. The book continues the journeys of these people from a shattered Europe, into Palestine, and toward a hard-won statehood.
So engrossing is the book that one day, about halfway in, I decided to take the old beat-up hardback into the bath with me. I don’t normally take baths. Think I just wanted to escape even further into the book. So there I was, halfway in, enjoying my bath, in the middle of an exciting scene, when I turned the page and . . . there was about a forty page chunk in the middle missing. I couldn’t believe my eyes. I blinked, looked again, but there was no doubt about it. It went from something like page 232 straight to page 280. You could even see the hollowed out chunk in the spine where those pages used to be.
Damn!
So frustrated was I that I did give passing thought to simply jumping ahead. I might even have read a sentence or two further, skipping over the missing chunk, before thinking better of it. Flinging the book aside, I dried myself off, got into my car, went to the bookstore, and bought another copy. And if the same thing happens to you?
You will too.
Great book. Sets the historical stage for the reestablishment of the nation of Israel in Palestine. It brings to light the bigoty, hatred and atrocities suffered by the Jewish people by various nations and people from ancient times to today. One cannot recognized the determination of the
After deciding to read it, I checked with the local public library, but they did
Normally I don't read any book this slowly, but "Exodus" was different: there was so much information, interesting information, that I felt I needed to take my time with it. I found myself reading way past my bedtime, until I was falling asleep with the book in my hand.
While a large book of over 600 pages, it never seemed like a chore to read, but more like a joy to read, to savor and meditate upon.
The content of the book shows that Leon Uris obviously did a tremendous amount of research, but his characters are also well-fleshed out, believable, and likeable.
Highly recommended.
My reactions
This is an epic novel covering the history of the Jewish people’s efforts to return to Palestine and form an independent state.
I found the writing uneven. I felt that Uris couldn’t make up his mind whether he was writing an epic romance, a war novel or a history of the formation of Israel. The reader is immersed in the plight of the orphans held “hostage” aboard the Exodus, and then taken back to the late 19th century for a history of the Jewish people in Russia, and Ari’s grandfather, father and uncle. By the time Uris comes back to the romance I’d forgotten about the couple. Then the novel concentrates once again on the political maneuverings and historical references to the formation of the country, and some very exciting battle scenes in the last half of the book. Sprinkled throughout are quite a lot of very anti-Arab and anti-British “observations.”
Still, it certainly made me think. And I am fully aware of how woefully ignorant I am of the details of this episode in history. I remember the movie (and especially the movie’s music score), which came out when I was nine, but I never actually saw it. I’ve read a couple of other books by Uris (Trinity and QB VII), and I remember liking them, so when a book group chose it for a monthly read I signed on. I’m glad I finally read this novel.
Uris attempts to tell the story of the birth of modern Israel--and maybe takes on too much. The story, set in 1946, is framed as being about the refugee ship Exodus, and attempts to force the British, who rule over Palestine, to allow the survivors of the Holocaust being kept in camps in Cyprus to sail to the promised land. Studded through this tale are flashbacks of various characters to help us understand what helps drive these immigrants.
There's the tale of Karen Clement, a German Jew who found refuge among the Danes, whose King said in a broadcast to his occupied country, that if any in his kingdom had to wear a band with a yellow star, he'd be the first--and whose people then evacuated their Jewish population to Sweden rather than let the Nazi's have them. But then Karen found the Holocaust orphaned her. There's Dov Landau, who as a young boy took part in the Warsaw Ghetto uprising, and then captured by the Nazis wound up shipped to Auschwitz. There's Ari Ben Canaan, whose father fled from the "Jewish Pale" of Russia and helped reclaim the land from the desert.
The style is pretty pedestrian--very simple syntax, intrusive tagging, and boy, someone please take away the exclamation key from this man. But by and large what kills this story is that it violates the first rule of writing--show, don't tell. Too many stories are laid out in narrative, as dry history, so that I wonder what is the point of making this fiction. Like another recent novel with fascinating historical detail but less than strong storytelling (one about Josephine Bonaparte) this left me wishing I had picked up a non-fiction book about the events and movements touched upon--Zionism, the Warshaw Ghetto and uprising, the founding of Israel--the Danish resistance to the Nazis, rather than this work of novel.
The story of "Exodus" could be summarised in one sentence: "Brave godlike Jews defeat cowardly, evil Arabs and build the beautiful country of Israel."
Yuck.
The struggle continues today and he story of these
The difference this time is that back in college, I took a course titled "History as Seen through the Eyes of the Novelist." Taught by a journalist/historian, the main thought came from the final exam question. Paraphrasing it, the question was, "Every novelist has a reason for writing his book. What was the reason for the books you read? Did the novelist achieve his goal?"
It is evident that Uris is pro-Israeli. It comes through in all of his noble characters that I fell in love with. Ari Ben Caanan, his father Barak, his sister Jordana, Jordana's love David Ben Ami, Karen Hansen Clement, and Dov Landau are richly drawn. Kitty Fremont is the American nurse through whom we see so many of the events and people.
However, Uris definitely paints with a broad negative brush when it comes to the Arabs in the stories. "Dirty" and "stinking" are used too frequently to describe the people, and their homes are almost uniformly "squalid." From what I have read about the history, it does seem accurate. However, I feel the loaded words weren't necessary to clarify what happened was wrong. I felt that I was being shoved down a path I would have taken anyway.
My final verdict is this is a 4.5 star book, losing a half star for the reasons above. It certainly accomplishes the author's objectives. It is an important novel in many ways because it clarifies how the roots of what happened during the Holocaust were already in too many countries. The Jewish ghettos, the pogroms, and the existing discriminatory laws made it too easy to ignore what was happening to a people who were already marginalized.
If you haven't read this massive historical novel, it is well worth the time, with the caveat above.