The pure element of time
By: Haim Be'er ; translated from the Hebrew by Barbara Harshav.
Contributors: Harshav, Barbara, 1940-
Series: The Tauber Institute for the Study of European Jewry series; Tauber Institute for the Study of European Jewry series (Unnumbered)
Publisher: University Press of New England
Published: 2003
Place of publication: Hanover
Language: eng
Number of pages: 282
Description: "Published in Hebrew as Havalim in 1998, The Pure Element of Time is a fictionalized autobiography about a writer's development." "Be'er was born in 1945, in an old Jerusalem neighborhood, the only child of an Orthodox but religiously eccentric family. The boy, who inherited an aesthetic sense from his parents, grew up to be a poet and novelist, who, in this book, seeks to reconstruct his parents' personalities, their peculiar relationship, and their influence on him as a person and a writer.".

"The Pure Element of Time is constructed in the form of a triptych, in which the two end panels frame the central and principal scene. The first part focuses primarily on the narrator's grandmother, a living archive of the family's history, as well as a natural storyteller whose tales entrance her grandson. The third part, which occurs principally after his father's death, depicts the author's first steps as a writer.

The middle part, the heart of the book, interweaves Be'er's childhood and adolescence with the story of his parents' marriage - a second and late marriage for both, into which each brought a difficult burden from the past. The deepest, most significant relationship is the one between the boy and his mother, with whom he forms an alliance - opposing his embittered father - which is never broken.

Be'er reveals his mother as the book's true heroine, for she shapes her son's character and sets him on his path as a writer."--BOOK JACKET.