Is There Place for a New Watchwoman for the House of Israel?. Zeruya Shalev’s Love Life

Abstract

In this article, I will discuss the special role that Zeruya Shalev has in the contemporary Israeli literature by the interpretation of the novel Love Life (1997). I shall claim that Shalev, as opposed to canonical Israeli writers such as Amoz Oz, A. B. Yehoshua and David Grossman, does not establish herself as the “watchman for the house of Israel”. Thus, she tells the private-domestic-feminine narrative in a way that does not reflect the Israeli national narrative.