What does the story of love and darkness express?

The Story of Love and Darkness is an autobiographical novel by amos oz, the most influential Israeli writer. This novel is mainly set in Jerusalem, showing readers the history and national narrative of a Jewish family for more than a hundred years, or family stories and national history. Family and nation are intertwined in the story of love and darkness, which not only takes you into a Jewish family to understand its joys and sorrows, but also takes you closer to a nation to see its gains and losses.

1948 The establishment of Israel changed the Palestinian territory and the fate of Jews and Palestinian Arabs, which directly led to the outbreak of the first Middle East war in 1948. Through several intensive descriptions, the book reproduces the disasters brought by the war to ordinary people, such as Jewish women hanging clothes and football boys who were hit by bullets, wealthy Arab businessmen who fled with their families, and relatives and friends gathered in the semi-basement to take refuge.

When the United Nations voted to establish Israel, that night was the most thrilling. Years of suffering, anxiety and fear of the Jewish people have finally come to a bright end. That night, their family embraced, shed tears happily, and reveled excitedly with the people of the whole country, but it was also an extremely dark night. For the Palestinians, they have been displaced since then, and the contradictions between the two ethnic groups have escalated, and killings and conflicts have continued. Since then, all those kind, polite and lovely Arabs have disappeared from our lives. History needs to be recorded, which is an unavoidable past in the future. I think this is the biggest reason why Oz wrote this book! Because Oz said, "You can avoid history, and history will not avoid you. You can run away or turn around, but you can't destroy them ... We can't be slaves of history, but in this land of Europe, people must kneel down and carry history on their shoulders. Only in this way can we go where we want to go ... "

Oz's mother is the daughter of a Polish miller. She is beautiful and elegant. She used to live in a garden house and often walked along the boulevard. She was full of poetic vision for the future, but when she came to Jerusalem, she hastily married Ali Crasner, who dreamed of becoming a university but could only compromise to become a librarian. With the misfortune of marriage and the hardships of life, her youth ideal gradually shattered; Coupled with insomnia and illness, family members' incomprehension and even betrayal, their inner sparks of life gradually burst and eventually committed suicide at the age of 39. Amos, the little hero in the novel at that time, was only 12 years old. After the death of his mother, the little hero poured out his cry from the bottom of his heart because of sadness, regret and missing, which was moving and could not help but sigh how much pain the writer experienced in his childhood.

The shadow of death has always accompanied the author's childhood-relatives and friends who stayed in Europe during World War II died in batches, and relatives and friends were constantly attacked and killed in the Palestinian-Israeli conflict, even his beloved pet, but nothing can compare with the bone-breaking, deep love, deep regret and resentment brought to the author by his mother's sudden suicide. From then on, it seems that there will be no more love and emotion. From then on, he and his father never mentioned his mother again, and his childhood ended.

The life of new immigrants is also the theme of this book. Most of Oz's parents and friends have lived in Europe and are typical pro-Europeans. They came to Jerusalem in the 1930s of 19, not because of the dream of building a country and rejuvenating the country called for by the Zionist pioneers, but because the anti-Semitic forces in Europe were rampant at that time, endangering their survival, so they left Europe where they had always been attached, hoping to return to the utopia of biblical times-Palestine in the East. But in their minds, Jerusalem has never been a "real city". The "real city" they yearn for refers to a modern city where the river is gurgling in the center of the city and small bridges such as Baroque, Gothic, Neoclassicism and Norman span; In contrast, Jerusalem is obviously too old, and the ancient style she represents is far from the expectations of these Jews who have experienced modern European civilization. So they are in Jerusalem, but their hearts are on the European continent. Poverty, heat wave, ruthless real life and a series of blows made them feel disillusioned and failed. This disillusionment and failure is not the personal tragedy of the author's mother Fanya and father Ali Claussner, but the tragedy of generations of Israeli and European Jewish immigrants.

Like many literary works describing the theme of the Middle East, The Story of Love and Darkness also describes Arab-Israeli relations and conflicts. The 1940s and 1950s, when the hero lived, were the formation periods of Israel. In the summer of 1947, little Amos visited a respectable Arab family in East Jerusalem with his parents' friends, which showed that Arabs and Jews were still living in harmony at that time. The little hero is talking to an Arab girl in the yard. Ridiculously posing as a national spokesman, he tried to tell the girl that the two nationalities should live in harmony on the same land and even climb a big tree to show the so-called new Hebrews. Unfortunately, the hammer slipped and accidentally injured the little girl's brother, resulting in her lifelong disability. Although the little hero has not been accused by anyone, his guilt and anxiety can be seen at a glance through his hesitant and blurred eyes.

At the same time, this exiled nation is also ups and downs in love and darkness, like a boat in a trickle of madness, like a candle in the wind. Where can they find the right to live? Is it history? Is it a natural law? Still naked: We shot, not because they are a murderous people, but because we have the right to live in our own land. Not just them. We kill people, we fight, not because they deserve to die, but because we want to live. Israel and Jews are very complicated identities and propositions. They think too much and admire culture, but too much culture is a burden. The struggle between left and right is embodied in this small family. My father kept repeating the endless explanation of the origin of words, as well as the romantic legends and ignorant fantasies about love conveyed by my mother in fantastic language. Probably because of such conflicts and contradictions, my mother took herself away-she was a smart and gorgeous flower, but it was in inappropriate soil, indeed. The mother's tragedy was inherited by her son from the poetic Oedipus complex, but he did not have endless happiness and struggle-who said that happiness does not struggle? When we love, we must experience happiness wholeheartedly; And what we think will inevitably bring struggle and even despair-choose to give up.

The Story of Love and Darkness is a novel that gives people a heavy feeling. I think it is a work that can touch the world! At least I cried a few times. As the writer Chi Li said, the subtlety of this novel lies in the fact that the history and reality of a nation are displayed infinitely and profoundly without answers, and some are only speechless with great sadness and meditation. Although the author amos oz claimed in the preface: "If I had to use one word to describe all the stories in my book, I would say: family. If I were allowed to describe it in two words, I would say: the family is unhappy. " However, this autobiographical novel is not only about family. Through the stories of his family and the families around him, the author wrote about the sufferings and pains of an era and a nation.

This is a work of thought without twists and turns. In trivial narration and poetic language, there are profound thoughts and delicate psychological analysis. This is not a life review of "it's none of your business, tears flow first" This should be a sigh for the shadow that still lingers. It is the shadow that has always been with us, and it is the unbearable weight of life. But who created the tragedy and where is the way out, this book has no answer, as the author said in the preface: "I didn't find the answer in the story of love and darkness." Readers of The Story of Love and Darkness, if you want to find out who committed the crime after reading more than 500 pages, you'd better read other books. " The world is inextricably intertwined, and it can never be as simple as right and wrong, right and wrong, and split into two.

The reading of The Story of Love and Darkness ends with a sad song as the background. The heart really suffered a strong shock and shock. Mother's suicide cast a faint gloomy tone on the whole book from the beginning. Even if there is humor, beautiful love and warm home in the story, it ultimately comes down to inner subversion, confusion and darkness. Although in the end, the black eyes endowed by darkness may have found light, everything has changed: I feel angry and even resentful about leaving this world regardless of my mother; The silence between the eternal man and his father-on the same day that his mother died, his son instantly grew into a man; Betraying the family-as he described it: I destroyed it by giving up my surname-implies some kind of psychological enlightenment, but it is more poetic.

For many Israeli readers, the things and places described in the book evoke something deep in their hearts and trigger a heartfelt reaction. For these people, reading The Story of Love and Darkness is not like reading a nostalgic work representing the past, but like reviving the past. In this sense, The Story of Love and Darkness is not just a book, but a natural work of art, which records the memories and feelings of the past.

After reading this book in a week, I drew a lot of expressions, laughed and shed tears, and thought deeply.