The Liberated Bride

This multi-layered novel, a classic of modern Israeli prose, takes place in the late 1990s and focuses on two diverse communities in Israeli society. The first is the Jewish intelligentsia, represented by the main character, Professor of Oriental Studies Yochanan Rivlin, which deals with the genesis of Arab terrorism, and his wife, Judge Chagit, and the second is the Palestinians living in the villages of Galilee and the West Bank, whose lives are bound and limited by occupation rules. Professor Rivlin cannot come to terms with the incomprehensible breakup of his son Ofer' s marriage, which occurred several years ago and about the cause of which both feuding spouses remain stubbornly silent. He feels, that Ofer has been living a kind of incomplete life since the divorce, and he is convinced, that if he found out, what happened, could help him. His search for the fateful secret turns almost into an obsession and sets a series of other events in motion. The story of the Rivlin family intertwines with that of the professor' s Arab graduate student, Samáher, who is trying to earn an academic degree by translating the works of contemporary Arab poets collected by an Israeli scholar killed in a terrorist attack. She too is hiding something, from others and from herself. All those unspoken and hidden secrets weigh down and bind their bearers. And only when they are freed from them can they achieve liberation.