Hebrew author Meir Ouziel spoke to Kritika Dua about his creative process, Jewish kingdom and satirical columns
The enchantment of Hebrew is such that its written and read from right to left. And Hebrew literature deals with a plethora of themes such as pain, love, friendship, betrayal, happiness and sorrow which are universal in nature as emotions connect humanity. Threading together the pieces of Jewish history, beginning from Biblical literature and Rabbinic literature, the themes changed with passage of time — ethical, philosophical and mystical. The contemporarary stories retain the traditional aspects but fuse it with modernity. Each nation has its own characterisation, conflicts it has to go through as a country and consequential success stories but the literary subjects remain the same across the globe.
The authors’ organisation of Israel, The Hebrew Writers Association comprising Meir Ouziel, Dorit Zilberman, Adiva Geffen, Hava Pinhas-Cohen and Smadar Shir wanted to have strong ties with fellow writers from Asian countries with similar operational institutes. In India, they found the creative minds in the form of Sahitya Akademi. Soon, six authors were invited to Israel and they gracefully accepted it and what followed was a meaningful conversation along with a published symposium. Extending the hand of friendship, the Indian writers invited them here. The Hebrew writers were astonished to witness the invigorating engagement and activities undertaken by the academy as well as the impressive infrastructure.
Meir Ouziel lovingly recalled the experience, “It was a wonderful experience meeting Indian writers from various parts of the country with regional stories as their subject, bringing commoner’s voices and concerns into the mainstream space.”
Ouziel has penned four novels and he took us through the creative process, “I write my novels with a unique perspective and fuse many layers of satire into it. Usually, authors tend to be serious when they write but I even mock myself through it. My work often depicts an imaginary past based on historical events, like sci-fi my novels can be put into the box of past-fi.” In the last book he wrote, Whatever seems right, the backdrop is biblical, the novel depicts a time when there was no king but Jewish people were keen to have one. Said he, “It’s said that they wanted a ruler but I believe that not all of them wanted a flesh and blood to lead them. So, I wanted to bring the voice of those few to the forefront using four young couples who did everything possible to block the arrival of the king. There is a love saga as well between them. One of the individual’s mind changes about shunning the king as he gets a job in the palace. The story is a meld of satire, wit, and humour.” The title seems apt as there is a phrase in the bible that refers to the statement before the king’s coronation ceremony took place.
Another novel of his, titled A little place with Debby, was translated into Russian. Said he, “It takes place in the kingdom of Khazaria which is a historical mystery. Jews had a huge kingdom 1100 years ago, bigger than France and Germany combined together but no one wants to know about it which will not change the fact that the kingdom existed. I told the story with the perspective of six young couples who had to travel the whole kingdom and the interesting instances that occur along the way.” The intention behind this work was to portray a Jewish kingdom and the non-linear work is smeared with endearment and tragedy along with a dose of humour and satire.
He exclaimed that Indians will not be able to understand the agony Jews had to go through as they always breathed in a safe environment and lived in their own country. Whereas Jews were in the diaspora, without a land to call their own but it’s not completely true. “This kingdom which was the empire of Jews existed in the pages of history but sadly few are aware of its existence.” He believes that one of the perks of being a writer is that they can invent anything out of intellect and no one will contradict him/her.
One of his novels, The first to the land of Zion, is a biography of his grandfather, Ben-Zion Meir Hai Ouziel who was the chief Rabbi of Israel in the similar lines of the Pope for Christians. It began when one of the leading publishing houses approached him to write about it. The offer which he initially declined as Ouziel is not a religious person whereas his grandfather was and thus he will not be able to do justice with his school of thought. But they insisted, so he told them that the literary piece will be half fiction and will also have a sprinkle of imagination. “When I started working on it, I told my grandfather, ‘I am going to write a novel about you and let the angel take me in your vicinity to see you up-close in action which will guide me and help me to describe your vision and life.” Keeping in sync with his other works, this one too had a witty and satirical tone which later garnered huge appreciation and a literary prize.
With a frequent mention of satire and humour, I was intrigued to ask the columnist that does he also find the same aspects in daily life as well. “I think of myself as a professional humourist now, as the journalistic writing spanned across four decades which I continue to do even today. I am used to seeing everything through the eyes of jocularity and I also found something strange and amusing during my visit here as well. I observe things in two ways, one being how it is in actuality and the other is how funny it is.” According to him, using wit and satire a person can convey several things which otherwise people wouldn’t pay attention to.
Sometimes he is quite politically inclined in his own words but has a different political point of view than the rest of Israel. “I have no enemies as I write pieces using hilarity as a mask even for the harsh reality which sometimes people refer as absurd, undermining its gravitas. But, if I will tell those things seriously, it will be less reader-friendly whereas in this case, they will laugh initially but in the process would be aware of the current scenario. It will not have a direct impact obviously but I believe that it will gradually change the minds much like the sugarcoated truth.” While writing, he also keeps in mind the readers in the young age group who are building their way of thinking through reading newspapers and Ouziel tries to shape their minds through his columns and those who connect with his thought process appreciate these undertones.
When asked how he achieves a balance between literature and journalism, the former deals with fiction and imagery mostly while the latter is inclined more towards practicality, Ouziel replied, “Journalism and literature are different in numerous aspects — literature is an imaginary world created by the author, it doesn’t have to represent reality at all and occurrences in daily life. I consider myself fortunate enough to be able to do both. I have been writing for a political column for long, it is published every weekend in the newspaper which presents the issues in a light-hearted manner. I started my journey as an author by penning literary pieces with satirical undertones, later some of them took shape of pure literature and were published as novels. It will not be incorrect to say that many journalists aspire to be writers, maybe not the hardcore ones but those who work in magazines or feature department are hidden writers.”