The Blue Mountain     by Meir Shalev, Translated by H Halkin Original title: Roman Rusi Published by Canongate Books Pub. Date: July 2002 Format: Paperback Dimensions: 0.97 x 7.84 x 5.18 in. ISBN: 1841952427 List Price: $14.00, £7.99 Buy online from Amazon.co.uk for £6.39 Buy online from Amazon.com for $11.20 Published by Aaron Asher Books Not available for ordering Published by Aaron Asher Books Pub. Date: 1991 Not available for ordering

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The story of the Second Aliya* migration to Israel of enthusiastic pioneer groups from Eastern Europe is vividly brought to life in this novel. These pioneers, their contributions to the settlements and villages in Israel, their willfulness and contradictions, are the leitmotif of the story. This is reinforced by the narrator, Baruch, grandson of one of the three founding fathers of a settlement in the Jezreel Valley. He grows up surrounded by the intimate memories and experiences, more compatible and comfortable himself with the past than the future. As a result he decides to establish a cemetery, ’Pioneer Home’, for all the Second Aliya participants both in Israel and abroad, that will nestle under the Blue Mountain of the title.

The tale of those who are eligible to be buried there, plus those who are not, fills this entertaining, tender novel. With wit and empathy Shalev presents us with some highly varied personalities, including Meshulam Tsirkin ’the scholar’, intent on creating his own unique tribute to the Pioneers, who contests most of Baruch’s decisions. Baruch himself, orphaned at a young age, is brought up, nurtured, educated, initiated by his devoted but eccentric grandfather. His world is enriched by the lively, philosophic Pinness, second of the trio who established the village, and teacher of all the generations of its children. The story abounds with agricultural detail, the very warp and weft of existence at that time. Life-cycles of the children and grandchildren of the pioneers, their loves and lusts, are interwoven with the life-cycles of the animals, insects and flora growing in abundance.

The novel unfolds according to the seasons and sensory, tactile timeframes; oftentimes the links to the world of nature are more significant than the human relationships. Uncle Ephraim and his Charolais bull, lovingly nurtured which he, unbelievably, carried on his strong shoulders almost everywhere; Rilov and his beehives, producing his exotic, seductive honey; Grandpa, with his passion and intuition for his prolific vineyard. Baruch recalls events through these associations, as he builds a picture of the intertwining relationships, especially of his Grandfather and Grandmother Feyge. The history of the Workingman’s Circle, three men plus Feyge who first came to this valley, unfurls through a series of flashbacks and insights: did Grandfather really love her, and if so, why did he continue receiving letters, by stork (!) from Russia? What happened to the personalities who left the village, never to return, or to Shifris, whose arrival was still awaited continually? How did Rachel teach Ephraim to walk silently, like ’a cat on sand’? And how would cousins Yosi and Uri resolve their relentless desire for the womenfolk of the village?

By arranging this formal tribute to the Pioneers, Baruch must also acknowledge the passing of time and a particular way of life. How he adapts to this, with an equivocal and nostalgic glance backward to his forbears, combined with a forward glance to the future, filled with trepidation, forms the impact of this captivating story. Meir Shalev, born 1948, has turned towards a significant stage in Israel’s social history, the Second Aliya of 1904-1914, and brought it to life with astonishing realism and understanding.

’The two old men drank a dozen glasses of tea, ate a pound of olives, and at 3.00 a.m. Pinness announced that he was going home and that if he ever found the Casanova, "he’ll rue the day he was born."

He opened the door and stood facing the darkness for a moment. Then he turned around and said to Grandfather that he felt heavy at heart because he had just thought of the hyena.

"The hyena is dead, Ya’akov," said Grandfather. "No one knows that better than you do. Relax."

"Every generation has its enemies," said Pinness darkly as he left.

He made his way home through the warm thicket of the night, treading upon "the thin crust on which our life has been established," and thinking, I knew, of the menacing creatures of havoc that hatched and swarmed ceaselessly around him, bursting in his somber nightmares like the bubbles of a foul, unruly past. He could sense the silent squat of the mongoose and see the blood-spotted face of the wildcat padding on its silken-pawed rampage of murder and plunder. Mice gnawed at the farmer’s labors in the fields of grain, and beneath the checkered carpet of plowed field, stubble, and orchard, waiting for the first signs of Doubt, growled the most legendary beast of all, the great swamp imprisoned by the founders. Far in the west he saw the orange-glowing lights of the big city beyond the mountain, with their seductive glitter of exploitation and corruption, of easy money, carnal baubles, and lewd winks.’