Customer Reviews

Old New Land: Altneuland (Masterworks of Modern Jewish Writing Series)

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"Altneuland (Old New Land) is one of the most remarkable books
of the twentieth century. . . . Altneuland is a blueprint of the perfect
Jewish state, a technocratic utopia, a socialist dream with all the
advantages of capitalism, an idealistic colonial enterprise, a model
of pure reason, a `light unto the nations.' It also helps to explain
the extremism of some of those who rebel against the dominance
of what is widely regarded as the arrogant West.
"By the 1920s, in Herzl's tale, Jerusalem would be transformed
into a thoroughly modern metropolis. . . . Arab and Jew would live
happily together in the New Society, working in vast `co-operative
syndicates.'. . . Herzl could not possibly have foreseen [the
tensions to come], and yet the seeds of tragedy are already buried
in this text, which was well meant, deeply idealistic, and in many
ways typical of everything that people who feel so victimized by
the West that they wish for its destruction fi nd most hateful."
--The New York Review of Books

While the content of Old New Land (Altneuland) gives a fascinating look into Hertzl's ideals for the development of a Jewish homeland, the Filiquarian edition makes reading continuity very difficult due to the tremendous amount of typographical errors. Often the typo does not interfere with the content of the text - modem for modern, or random periods throughout - but there are cases where the characters' statements are incomprehensible due to the error. Filiquarian Publishing, LLC offers no contact information on their website or within the book.

an amazing fantasy by a visionary who never lived to see (most of) this actually come true! how did he know? read the book, then read about the author, then check out this miracle.

Herzl had the vision of the Jewish state to come, and published this in 1897.He foresaw that in fifty years the state would come into being.
There are antiquated, archaic element in his vision, but essentially it is one of the Jew's being a free people in their own land.