レビュー要約

• The novel carefully balances historical tension and personal feeling, with the era's atmosphere and the protagonist's perspective closely aligned.

レビュー

• This is an insight to a most difficult time right after the end of World War II at the end of the British Mandate in Palestine. The affect the political system had on the lives of the people living in the area is clearly defined. A most insightful story

• Through the character of Evelyn Sert, aka Priscilla Jones, Linda Grant describes what it was like in the newly established Tel Aviv just after WWII. There were various bands of warrior Jews who had different degrees of hardness in their anti-British attitudes and therefore, what was acceptable in terms of getting the Brits out. What comes across clearly are the differing strands of Jewishness, from the socialist kibbutzniks from Russia to the very right wing Zionists, all struggling to end the 2,000 year wanderings of the Jews who were heartily sick of pogroms and being pushed from pillar to post. Many aspects of contemporary culture are mentioned, from high classics to American movies. In fact, the ultra-romantic Schoenberg composition Verklaerte Nacht comes to determine the course of Evelyn’s life when she is bundled out of Palestine by British security. The novel, after this point, leaps forwards many decades when Evelyn returns to Tel Aviv and finds it utterly different. She has a conversation with her young self, whose conviction and passion she has compassion for while asserting a calmer point of view in old age. She weighs questions of morality when considering the scope of Jewish history and the ongoing violence between Arabs and Israelis. A rich and satisfying novel, especially the early section.

• Ben scritto!

• I downloaded this book just before my first trip to Tel Aviv and read it while I was there. The novel gives you so much background information about this city and about Palestine just before Israeli independence. This doesn't mean it's only worth reading if you're planning a trip to Israel! The writing is good, the characters credible, the story interesting. Young narrator Evelyn Sert loses her mother and leaves her native London to try and make a life in Palestine - on the boat, she has to wear a cross to pretend that she is Christian intent on visiting the holy land. She then tries to find a home in the newly developing Jewish / Israeli society. I will not give away too much in order not to spoil the book, but the reader gets a very good impression of what the kibbutzim at the time looked like, of what living in the white city was like, how people spent their days - and nights, for that matter - , how they - British, Jews, Arabs- related to each other. It is a great read for more information on this period of Israeli history, on the visions of the Zionists and the practical difficulties.

• 'When I Lived in Modern Times' is a beautifully written story of a young Jewish girl's search for her personal identity as she exchanges a post-war England for the last days of Palestine under British colonial rule. The story moves from one of the original Jewish kibbutz to the brand-new city of Tel Aviv as Evelyn Sert attempts to reinvent herself as one of the new Jews. Her encounters with the English expatriates plus her involvement with the fringes of the Irgun and Haganah resistance movements are a complicated mixture of changing personal attitudes and an uncertainty as to where her future really lies. The wheel goes a full circle and, many years later, her final visit to Tel Aviv underlines her original uncertainty over her role in the creation of Eretz Israel - and her near-disillusionment over what has actually been created.

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