About this title: Sabar once looked at his [immigrant] father with shame, scornful of the alien who still bore scars on his back from childhood bloodlettings. This book, he writes, is a chance to make amends.--"New York Times Sunday Book Review."
Note: This is a general synopsis. Each listing is described below.
Edition: First Edition
Binding: Hardcover
Publisher: Algonquin Books
Date Published: 8/21/2008
ISBN-13:9781565124905ISBN:1565124901
Description: Fine. 1565124901 Ships next business day. NEW/UNREAD! ! ! Text is Clean and Unmarked! --Be Sure to Compare Seller Feedback and Ratings before Purchasing--Has a small black line on bottom/exterior edge of pages. May have light shelf wear to cover from storage, if any. read more
Edition: First Edition
Binding: Hardcover Cloth Spine
Publisher: Algonquin, Chapel Hill
Date Published: 2008
ISBN-13:9781565124905ISBN:1565124901
Description: Near Fine in Near Fine jacket. 8vo. 332pp. including bibliography. A story of hope in a land of violent conflict. Very little wear to book or jacket. The publisher's $25.95 price is in place. read more
Binding: Hardcover
Publisher: Algonquin Books
Date Published: 2008
ISBN-13:9781565124905ISBN:1565124901
Description: New. Brand new, fresh and crisp. Never read or owned. May have a remainder mark. Product Description: For his first 31 years Sabar considered his father, Yona, an embarrassing anachronism. Ours was a clash of civilizations, writ small. He was ancient Kurdistan. I was 1980s L.A. Yona was a UCLA professor whose passion was his native language, Aramaic. Ariel was an aspiring rock-and-roll drummer. The birth of Sabar's own son in 2002 was a turning point, prompting Sabar to try to understand his ... read more
Binding: Hardcover
Publisher: Algonquin Books
Date Published: 2008
ISBN-13:9781565124905ISBN:1565124901
Description: New in New jacket. Brand new, crisp and unread! May have publishers remainder mark on the edge just to assure it is not returned to the store. Hardcover edition. From Publishers Weekly: Starred Review. For his first 31 years Sabar considered his father, Yona, an embarrassing anachronism. Ours was a clash of civilizations, writ small. He was ancient Kurdistan. I was 1980s L.A. Yona was a UCLA professor whose passion was his native language, Aramaic. Ariel was an aspiring rock-and-roll drummer. ... read more
Binding: Hardcover
Publisher: Algonquin Books
Date Published: 2008-08-21
ISBN-13:9781565124905ISBN:1565124901
Description: NEW. Hardcover. From an inventory that is 100% brand-new, 100% direct from the publishers' distribution channel. We carry NO pre-owned, NO remaindered. We pack in CARDBOARD to ensure the pristine quality is maintained. (Bubble-wrap alone is NOT sufficient to protect from USPS equipment. ) Guaranteed brand-NEW, protected with CARDBOARD, your satisfaction is guaranteed. BKLUVID: 9781565124905. read more
Binding: Hardcover
Publisher: Algonquin Books
Date Published: 2008
ISBN-13:9781565124905ISBN:1565124901
Description: New. Brand New! Buy with confidence-your satisfaction is guaranteed at B-Logistics! Due to the large scale of our operation, we do not have access to the specific contents/condition of our items. Please note that Expedited shipping is not available at this time. read more
Binding: Hardcover
Publisher: Algonquin Books
Date Published: 2008
ISBN-13:9781565124905ISBN:1565124901
Description: New, Publisher overstock, may have small remainder mark. Excellent condition, never read, purchased from publisher as excess inventory. read more
Binding: Hardcover
Publisher: Algonquin Books
Date Published: 2008
ISBN-13:9781565124905ISBN:1565124901
Description: New, Publisher overstock, may have small remainder mark. Excellent condition, never read, purchased from publisher as excess inventory. read more
Edition: First Edition (1st printing)
Binding: Hardcover
Publisher: Algonquin Books, Chapel Hill, North Carolina, U.S.A.
Date Published: 2008
ISBN-13:9781565124905ISBN:1565124901
Description: As New in As New jacket. 12mo-over 6¾"-7¾" tall. This is a New and Unread copy of the first edition (1st printing)l. read more
Binding: Hardback
Publisher: Workman Pub Co
Date Published: 2008
ISBN-13:9781565124905ISBN:1565124901
Description: Sabar once looked at his [immigrant] father with shame, scornful of the alien who still bore scars on his back from childhood bloodlettings. This book, he writes, is a chance to make amends. --"New York Times Sunday Book Review. " read more
Description: New. 1565124901 *NEW BOOK! * RETURNS ARE NO PROBLEM! We LOVE happy customers. All our orders sent with tracking information. ALIBRIS. read more
I was surprised at how enjoyable this book was and easy to read (once I got into it...the first 15 pages or so). I had selected it as one of my 'grow my brain' books to read inbetween my fun reads.
What a pleasant surprise. Before reading this, I can't say I knew what a Kurdish Jew was, really, and how one differred from European Jews I'd read about. I didn't have an understanding of Israel/Palestine/Iraq and their relationship with one another, other than knowing it was full of turmoil.
Sabar did a great job of interjecting snippets of history (those paragraphs I sometimes had to read a few times to make sure they sunk in) in a great great story of his father's upbringing and immigration to America. I was fascinated, having never been in touch with anyone's story who grew up in an isolated part of the world where Aramaic ("the language of Christ") was the main language (and just spoken at that. Zahko, where Sabar's father grew up, was so isolated that many villagers didn't even read. They were born, lived and died in Zahko, having never ventured into the 'outside' world.) Fascinating.
I find myself more connected to my past after reading this book. I realize that I am much more a creation of those who went before me than I before acknowledged.
My love for people just grew that much deeper. Thanks for broadening my Horizons, Sabar!"
"This book was recommended to me by one of my customers and I was not sure if I want to read it at all. I am glad that I did. It is not an ordinary biography; this book is a window into the world that does not exist anymore. Imagine a "Lost tribe of Israel" left to live peacefully in the midst of an Arab world. Imagine people who were so cut from the modern world that they spoke the Ancient Aramaic in the 20th century, while scholars pronounced this language dead for hundreds of years. It was the language of Jesus, the language used by Assyrian and Persian empires. Isolated and surrounded by Turkey, Iraq, Iran and Syria the Kurdish Jews kept their culture intact for nearly 3000 years. When they had to leave Iraq for Israel after the 1949 their Arab neighbours cried and mourned their departure. In Israel they were looked upon as barbarians and dimwits without any prospects. Here is a book about the life in exile, about the drama of integration into the new culture and the gap between the fathers and sons. And the most important this book is about the power of language and the past that can destroy the family or bring it together."
"Finished - wow! What can I say? I guess first of all I want to (((HUG))) GR fro existing, for showing me all these MARVELOUS books!!!! OK, about the book. Well, how does the relationship between father and son(author) end up. It ends up right where I wanted it to endup, but you will have to read the book to find this out! It is summed up in the first three sentences on page 322 in the last chapter. Here is one last interesting quote: "There is a counterpoint to the familiar immigrant story of opportunities won: It is the story, less often told, of cultures lost." Yes cultures are at least watered-down, but if we are aware of this danger maybe we can take steps to help preserve cultures. Furthermore, I believe that we pass on to our children and they to their own children the cultures of our ancestors. Family customs have a tendancy to stick, although perhaps not in exactly the original form. This is evident in the author's family, in mine too and I think in all families where they have emigrated to a new land. I think for many of us we learn to like some things about the new country and also like other things about the country we have left. We pass on these memories to our children. How horrible the world would be it it lacked diversity. What should I read now....... So exciting to start a new book!
Through page 272: I MUST add this too! Father and son are at Cambridge taking part at a high level academic conference on the Neo-Aramaic Language. The author MUST be beginning to see the the wonderful character of his father. His father is one of the few of academia who can talk so we all understand, who can make us laugh and feel the passion for a subject. Who brings all the scientific gibberish back to plain, straight, clear understandable words that ALL understand.
Through page 269: What is it like to go back to a place where you grew up? Not many of us live in the same place all our lives, so this is a question that speaks to us all. I have found that the man-made things, yes they change. Nevertheless you recognize the "land". The hills the trees. Somehow the landscape remains and you can reconnect. This is easier in the country rather than in urban areas where everything is practically gone, but teeny bits remain even there. Also, is going back a disappointment? Another topic in this part of the book concerns the author's attempt to reconnect with his father. Quite simply their relationship was not good at all. They were up to that point very different people. When the author had a son himself he started understanding what it is like - "to be a father", to love a child irregardless of differences. Maybe it is pure biology, but you just do love your children. All of them, and they too are usually very different from eachother! That is where I am now. I do not know where this will end up for these two people, the author and his father.
Through page 209: Studying at Yale the author very well captures how it must feel to fall into east coast American ivy league life, having first grown up in a a remote Kurdish village. Even life in bustling Jerusalem has no comparison to life at Yale. I have read lots of immigrant memoirs, but this is one of the best, something I clearly recognized.
Through page 176: The family emigrates to Israel. An analysis of the Jewish melting-pot is fascinating:
"Itzhak Ben-Zvi and David Ben-Gurion were sometimes called 'the twins'....Ben-Gurion as Prime Minister, Ben-Zvi as President. Yet, on the question of Israel's Middle Eastern immigrants, they never saw eye to eye. To Ben-Gurion Israel was a melting-pot. ....Ben Zvi was perhaps the only man in Israel with the stripes to challenge the melting-pot theory....For Ben-Zvi, the truth about Jews' common past could best be glimpsed, not through an erasure of differences, but through the light refracted by its many subcultures."
Or on page 69 and 70 about the great Muslim, Kurdish warrior general Saladin, a champion of jihad born in Tikrit 1138, who repelled the invasion of King Richard the Lionhearted and his Crusaders:
"Yet Saladin is remembered today less for his military cunning than his chivalry. When Richard's horse was killed, Saladin sent two replacements. When Richard fell ill after his victory at Jaffa, Saladin sent a sorbet of fruit and snow to cool his rival's fever. Christian crusaders had slaughtered thousands of Muslim prisoners, but after his victory, Saladin let Christians exit Jerusalem unmolested."
There is so much here of interest! Religious extremism was rare. Is that the key difference? History moves in cycles, but can't we lessen the waves' peaks and troughs?
Through page 69: I love this, so I am sharing a bit with you. Lots of fascinating history dating from 2700 years ago up to what happened to Irag in WW1 and during WW2. Absolutely fascinating. If history isn't your thing it is still marvelous b/c family life in the isolated mountain village of Zakno constitutes the dominant thread. There are photos of the people and the place and a map - hurrah for books with maps, although it is a bit rudimentary. I suck up hearing about how the Jews, Christians and Muslims ENJOYED eachother's company:
"Seclusion (in the isolated mountain village) bred fraternity: Muslim, Jew and Christian suffered alike through the region's cruel cycles of flood, famine and Kurdish tribal bloodshed. They prospered alike when the soil yielded bumper crops of wheat, gall nuts and fragrant tobacco. In important ways they were Kurds first and Muslims, Christians and Jews second. Muslims sent Jews bread and milk as gifts after Passover. They ate matzoh, which they called "holiday bread" as a delicacy. They sent their Jewish neighbors hot tea during the Sabbath, when Jews were forbidden to light fires. Some Muslims even asked the synagogue to wake them early in the days before Yom Kippur . They viewed early rising on Jewish days of penitence as bringing good luck. And the Jews paid back the respect, forgoing cigarettes , for instance, during the holy month of Ramadan , when Muslims may not smoke."
Can't we learn from this something? In Bagdad, at this time, riots and fighting between Muslims and Jews were violent and constant.
Through page 28: I am totally loving this. Although predominantly non-fiction, the suthor is a true story teller. His grandfather is described, when he is first presented to his future bride who is only 13, as: "a short man in a shalla u-shappiksa of such brightly colored stripes that Miryam had to resist twin impulses - the first to giggle, the second to flee. The traditional billowy trousers and short sheep's-wool jacket raiated every color of the rainbow. Someone, it seemed, had gotten a little carried away in Mr. Beh Sabagha's dye shop."
The factual information about the almost dead language Aramaic is fascinating. The book is both about this language and the author's family."
"An excellent, award winning biography from a California raised man trying to better understand his father's journey from Kurdistan to Jerusalem to the United States.
Tucked on an island in the river, cut off from the other tribes of Judaism, lived a small but thriving community of Kurdish Jews. Now a part of Iraq, the island town of Zakho found Arabs and Jews living peacefully together, speaking the ancient tongue of Aramaic, until the Jews were forced out of Iraq in the 1950s. Israel absorbed hundreds of thousands of these Sephardic Jews, but they were not welcomed with open arms like the Jews of Europe were. Ariel Sabar's grandparents had a very hard time assimilating, but not so his father Yona, who was just shy of his 13th birthday when they landed in Israel. Yona Sabar thrived in Jerusalem, his fluency in Aramaic proving to be his ticket to a better life, via graduate study at Yale University. Instead of returning to Israel, Yona stayed in the United States, married and moved west to work in the Middle Eastern language department of UCLA. Like his parents, he also had trouble assimilating, finding the United States a very confusing place to live. His children grew up typical California children, embarrassed of their immigrant father.
By traveling back to Zakho to learn about his ancestry, Sabar comes to write a very interesting and readable story. It is a story of maturity and coming of age from the author, a story of the history of a little known group of Jews who evolved so differently from the more well known Jewish tribes, a story of the difficulties of immigrating and assimilating, and a story of tolerance and acceptance - from the Arabs who lived so peacefully with the Jews to the parents who accept their Gentile daughter-in-law to the son who embraces his Judaism but rejects customs that many Jewish parents would find unthinkable."
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