To Know a Woman [Paperback]

Amos Oz (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: May 21, 1992

Following the bizarre accidental death of his wife, Israeli secret service agent Yoel Ravid retires to the suburbs with his daughter, mother and mother-in-law. After a lifetime of uncovering other people's secrets he is forced to look back at the lies he has told himself; at the desolate enigma of his wife's life and death; his years of service to the state and the riddle of his daughter's behavior.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

One of Israel's best-known novelists pens a compelling psychological study of an Israeli espionage agent who retires following his wife's accidental death.

Copyright 1992 Cahners Business Information, Inc.

--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Review

Peerless Israeli storyteller Oz presents 18 months in the life of painfully self-contained Yoel Raviv, retired from the Israeli Secret Service and trying to escape the ghosts of his professional life and his dead wife - a woman he's still struggling to know. Bedeviled by memories of his wife Ivria, accidentally electrocuted in his absence on business in Helsinki; of his servitude to agency contact Yirmiyahu Cordovero ("Le Patron"); and of an obsessively recurring series of frozen images - the statue of a cat mysteriously springing free of its base; the figure of Edgar Linton from Wuthering Heights; a wheelchair-bound beggar; a copy of Mrs. Dalloway left behind in Helsinki - Yoel reacts in two conflicting ways. Frantic to be left alone, he changes his name, retreats to a new house in a Tel Aviv suburb, and refuses a posting to Bangkok. At the same time, he reaches out equally frantically to his strong-willed, epileptic daughter Netta, about to be conscripted, and to his quarreling mother and mother-in-law, by asking them all to live with him; he also begins a robotic friendship with real-estate agent Arik Krantz and an equally passive love affair with next-door neighbor Annemarie Vermont, shepherded by her oppressively approving bother Ralph. Floating through this tangle of relationships, Yoel keeps telling himself that things will work out, that tomorrow is another day, but he's wrong - as he sees when his mother and Netta's lover Duby Krantz tell him off for his inability to accept people without controlling them, and when he's unable to get forgiven by the father of the agent killed in Bangkok in his place. Slowly, slowly, Oz thaws out his likable, paralyzed hero and returns him to provisional membership in the human race. A meditative third-person confessional of hauntingly quiet power - and a treasure for readers who think contemporary novels carry too much plot. (Kirkus Reviews )

One of Israel's best-known novelists pens a compelling psychological study of an Israeli espionage agent who retires following his wife's accidental death. (Publishers Weekly ) --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 264 pages
• Publisher: Trafalgar Square (May 21, 1992)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0099913402
• ISBN-13: 978-0099913405
• Product Dimensions: 5.2 x 0.7 x 7.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 6.4 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.4 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (11 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #3,107,729 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

21 of 23 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A Joy to Read, August 5, 2001

By 

David Rabenowitz - See all my reviews

This review is from: To Know a Woman (Harvest in translation) (Paperback)

Mr Oz has taken the simpliest of stories and made it a wonderful book to read. His character development made the people so lifelike. A troubled soul has to come to terms with his life and the relationships he had and has with his wife, his daughter, his mother and mother-in-law. His growing awareness of the importance of just living made this novel a true joy. As the novel progresses, we become more involved with the present, rather than the past. Finally we are left with the feeling that the future will be fine.

26 of 30 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars To Know A Man, October 6, 2004

By 

prisrob "pris," (New England USA) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (TOP 500 REVIEWER)   

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This review is from: To Know a Woman (Harvest in translation) (Paperback)

Yoel Ravid, is my kind of man. He was an Israeli secret service agent for most of his life, and had the ability to sense the truth in people. Amos Oz has written an extraordinary novel, "To Know a Woman". However, in Yoel's quest to find the secret of his life and what might have gone wrong; we learn as does Yoel, much more about his life and how to live it. This novel has been misnamed, it should be "To Know a Man"!

We meet Yoel as he is exploring his retired life. His wife of many years, Irvia, has died suddenly. He is left with a daughter, Netta, whom he doesn't really know. His mother and his mother-in-law live together in an apartment near by, and Yoel feels the need to bring the family together. He cannot abide to live in the apartment that he lived in with his wife. He finds a house to rent with four bedrooms and everyone moves in together. This is a strange family- rarely do they speak or talk of important matters. They sit at night watching TV and rarely speak. Netta, his daughter has epilepsy and we learn that Irvia could not accept this diagnosis. Netta is a young woman who reads- she eats and sleeps at will, stays up all hours of the night and attends school where she does not fit in.

Yoel feels out of place. He is used to being busy all the time, now he has very little to do. He thinks a lot about his life with his wife, how they met and married and their life with Netta. He thinks about his profession. He was rarely at home and his job was his life even though he loved his family. He drives his car at night and thinks. He sleeps little. He visits his next door neighbors who are an interesting couple, brother and sister. And he forms a relationship with his realtor, they go sailing every Saturday, and the realtor tells Yoel all of his secrets. All of this introspection is good for Yoel. His mother and mother-in-law are always arguing. His daughter tells him , "As you wish". for any question he asks her. No one it seems in the family is able to talk freely about what they are really thinking.

The process of Yoel's assimilation of life is a joy to behold. It is a quiet coming together, and we are treated to the most wonderful writing . Yoel's daily life is told in such great detail and with such an explicit description that the mundane becomes revered. A life to be lived. This is my first Amos Oz book, and I look forward to reading his entire collection. Highly Recommended. prisrob

15 of 16 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Not a thriller, June 19, 2005

By 

Moten Swing (NYC) - See all my reviews

This review is from: To Know a Woman (Harvest in translation) (Paperback)

Don't expect a thriller. While Yoel, the protagonist, was a secret service agent, and while he struggles to remember key events from his past that haunt him, this is not a book about secret agents. There is no huge climax. No car chases.

Instead, this is a story of a man recovering from trauma, learning to relate to people, learning to love his daughter, learning to live without his wife. He wanders through his days in a fog, focusing on tiny details of the world, while not responding to the largest figures in his life. It is a story of a sad man who doesn't even know he is sad.

The textures of the book are amazing, giving the reader a perfect sense of the confusion and separation that is Yoel's life. The story builds nicely, and provides some suspense, but the main focus here is the window into the mind of a lost man.