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Type of bind: Paperback
Dewey Decimal Number: 892.436
EAN num: 9780156013123
ISBN number: 0156013126
Label: Harvest Books
Manufacturer: Harvest Books
Quantity: 1
Page Count: 216
Printing Date: October 01, 2002
Publishing house: Harvest Books
Sale Popularity Level: 582109
Studio: Harvest Books
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Product Description:
The Same Sea is Amos Oz's most adventurous and inventive novel, the book by which he would like to be remembered. The cast of characters ranges from a prodigal son to a widowed father who has taken in his son's enticing young girlfriend, who in turn sleeps with her boyfriend's close friend. The author himself receives phone calls from his characters, criticizing the way he portrays them in his novel. In this human profusion there is chaos and order, love and eroticism, loyalty and betrayal, and ultimately an extraordinary energy.
'I wrote this book with everything I have. Language, music, structure--everything that I have. . . . This is the closest book I've written. Close to me, close to what I always wanted. . . . I went as far as I could.'--Amos Oz
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Rated by buyers 
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The Same Sea shows Oz at his working best: the perfect conjunction of form and content. Much like in his novel The Black Box (composed of letters written by the major and minor characters) The Same Sea is a series of prose poems, loosely arranged, both chronologically and thematically. Taken together, they provide a patchwork of detail about a half a dozen characters, along with a "fictional narrator," perhaps Oz himself (a post-modern touch) who also interacts with his creations in humorous and moving ways. The series of poems, like the sea of the title, are constantly changing, yet remain the same. Oz seems to tell us, human aspirations, dreams, and frustrations remain fluid and fixed for all. Importantly, this highly experimental novel is heavily influenced by the Hebrew Bible, and the translator provides some of the most important texts at the end of the novel. A master creation by Israel's greatest living writer, The Same Sea is a most accomplished work.
Rated by buyers -
Amusing, appealing, with just a hint of an underlying deeper significance. This book will entertain anyone who can enjoy an 'out of the ordinary' reading experience.
Rated by buyers 
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In this book, Mr.Oz goes to war against all rules -- and the rules win.
He breaks the narrative up into short passages, each with a cryptic headline, and jumps from point of view to point of view, sometimes within the same sentence. All of a sudden he pops into the narrative (as the 'fictional narrator'} to explain that it's poetry I have been reading and that he understands how wierd it is to set a story in the town of Bat Yam.
From then on the reader meets Mr Oz every now and then, sometimes in the guise of the 'fictional narrator'sometimes in the flesh in his in his home in Arad. Why? I couldn't figure it out. Was he also getting bored with the story's characters?
The upshot of this all, at least for this reader, is a complete lack of tension, and a complete lack of interest in the characters and their fate.
There must be something in those rules.
Rated by buyers 
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I am usually not mean-spirited to books I read. I always try to find something of value, but it is sometimes simply impossible. This is the case with "The Same Sea". I found it lacking in character development and plot, which leaves us only with language as the possible source of aesthetic achievement. I admit some of the poetic passages were beautiful in a subtle way, but that wasn't enough to win my attention. If Mr. Oz wanted to write a poem, he should have done so explicitly, without disguising it as a novel. The "plot" is simple yet unappealing: an old Israeli man loses his wife to death; his son becomes depressed and travels to Tibet, Bangladesh and other lands to meditate and overcome his grief. His girlfriend is cheated by a film producer, loses her money and moves in with Albert, his boyfriend's father. Then she sleeps with her botfriend's best friend. That's it.
I didn't find any of the characters interesting, whether good or bad. They just ruminate about their problems, but there's not really a plot or some interaction that becomes appealing, at least for this reader. I'm not a prude at all, but a story that centers on the sexual lust of an old widow for his son's girlfriend is not terribly interesting (maybe Nabokov could have made it so). She's kind of cruel walking around the house with a towel for all clothes, as well as giving him glimpses of young flesh. Naughty girl and dirty old man. The son's reflections on his travels weren't much illuminating either. He made me remember the main character in Somerset Maugham's "The Razor's Edge", but without the vitality and passion for knowledge that characterized him. All in all, a disappointment of a book.
Rated by buyers -
This is Amos Oz at his best. In the "Same Sea" Oz continues to grow and explore the boundries of literature and of the human condition.
His ability to synthesize prose and poetry is superb. He is among the greatest contemporay authors. He defines the relationships between the characters to each other to themselves and to the universe with grace. Beyond that he introduces himself as both chronicler and character without hubris and with grace. This is a literary feat. Many have failed at it. The best book I've read this year.
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