Special Guest Appearance

AMOS OZ

Preeminent Israeli author AMOS OZ is the recipient of numerous international awards, including his country's most prestigious prize, the Israel Prize for Literature, and most recently, the France Culture prize for his new book A Tale of Love and Darkness.

His books and stories have been translated into more than 30 languages in 35 countries. He has published more than 22 books, among them 11 novels, three collections of stories and novellas, a children's boook and seven books of articles and essays (plus five selections of essays that appeared in various languages). He has also published some 470 articles and essays on literary, political, and social topics in Israel and abroad, and remains one of the leaders of the Israeli peace movement.

Professor Oz was born in Jerusalem in 1939. His family included scholars and teachers, some of whom were militant right-wing Zionists who emigrated to Israel in the early 1930s from Russia and Poland. At age 15, he left Jerusalem to live, work, and complete his education in Kibbutz Hulda. Many of his stories are set either on a kibbutz or in Jerusalem, both of which he presents as microcosms of Israeli society.

Since the 1967 war, Professor Oz has published numerous articles and essays about the Israeli/Arab conflict, campaigning for an Israeli/Palestinian compromise to be based on mutual recognition and co-existence between Israel and a Palestinian state in the West Bank and Gaza.

He holds the Agnon Chair of Hebrew Literature at the Ben-Gurion University of the Negev in Beer-Sheva, and continues to devote his time to writing, teaching, and actively campaigning for the Israeli Peace movement.