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Review by Nan Goldberg
It's summer in Jerusalem, 1947, and the situation is grave.
In a few months, the United Nations will vote to establish a Jewish homeland in Palestine, but right now that outcome is far from certain. Jews and Arabs are skirmishing for territory, and both sides hate the British administrators, who have imposed a seven p.m. curfew on the entire city. Of course, Jewish underground fighters break curfew almost every night: 12-year-old Proffy knows this because he can hear the sound of gunfire from his bedroom window.
Proffy, the son of Holocaust survivors from Eastern Europe, is obsessed with fantasies of throwing the British out of his country. He and two school friends, Ben Hur and Chita, have formed an underground unit of their own -- the FOD (Freedom or Death) -- and have spent a good part of the summer constructing a rocket that they plan to aim at Buckingham Palace.
But in "Panther in the Basement," Israeli author Amos Oz's latest novel, Proffy discovers that questions of right and wrong, friendship and enmity, loyalty and betrayal, are not as simple as he thought.
"Everything in the world has at least two sides," pronounces Proffy's father early on, and that statement turns out to be the crux of the story. Dilemmas pervade this tiny book: Who is the enemy, the Arabs or the British? Can one be loyal to two people who are in conflict with each other? If the Germans apologize for slaughtering the Jews, is it right or wrong to forgive them? Should Proffy apologize for having sort of peeked through a window as Ben Hur's sister was undressing, even though she probably hadn't even seen him and might be embarrassed to find out?
But Proffy's most important concern is this: Although the British are his sworn enemies, he finds himself drawn to one particular British officer, whom he meets when he breaks curfew one night. The officer, a pink-faced, overweight, gossipy, lonely, rather pathetic soul, is an amateur linguist who speaks to him in earnest, antiquated Hebrew: "Whither dost thou hasten?" he asks Proffy, and then, escorting him home, "Let not the lad go astray in the darkness."
The officer, Sergeant Dunlop, and Proffy meet several times a week in a neighborhood pub, exchanging English lessons for modern Hebrew lessons. Proffy tells himself he is actually spying on Dunlop, hoping Dunlop will casually reveal British secrets. Proffy himself is so cautious about security that he won't even tell Dunlop his name, nor will he accept payment for the lessons (except for some crackers and a lemonade). Still, he gradually becomes fond of the fumbling British officer.
Is this itself a betrayal? FOD leader Ben Hur, accusing Proffy of treason, argues: "Loving the enemy, Proffy, is worse than betraying secrets. Worse than betraying fighters. Worse than informing. Worse than selling them arms. Even worse than going over and fighting on their side. Loving the enemy is the height of treachery."
Oz's novels are often allegories about the ethical dilemmas of the Israel-Arab peace process. His sympathetic view of the Palestinian Arabs' plight and his prolific writing, both fictional and non-, have made him a spokesman for the (very large) segment of his countrymen who believe that Israel should make territorial sacrifices in the interests of peace -- and of morality. This novel, another broadside in that battle, is a bit too insistent for my taste. Proffy's 12-year-old concerns echo the adult author's a little too closely to be quite credible, and Oz's message drives the medium a little too hard.
Still, if you haven't read Oz before, this is a short, sweet introduction: an elegant coming-of-age story about a very smart boy whose collision with life's endless contradictions resonates the way only good literature can.
Nan Goldberg is the former book review editor of "The Record" in Bergen County, New Jersey.
©1997, ProMotion, inc.
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