Michael Oren on Writing Fiction and Serving Israel

The Tikvah Podcast

Tikvah

Judaism, Politics, Religion & Spirituality, News

4.6 • 620 Ratings

🗓️ 21 January 2021

⏱️ 33 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

Very few contemporary public figures have had as many successes in as many fields as Michael Oren. A writer-statesman in the model of Thucydides, Oren was Israel’s ambassador to the United States during the Obama years, and was before that a historian of the Jewish state, the author of perhaps the best single book on the Six-Day War. He’s also worked in think tanks, been a professor at Ivy League institutions, and served as an MK in the Israeli parliament. Now, with the recent publication of The Night Archer, a collection of short stories, Oren returns to the genre of fiction, a pursuit that animated his younger years.

This week on the podcast, Oren joins Mosaic’s editor Jonathan Silver to discuss how his varied career fits together—how the writing of fiction relates to the writing of history, how the study of history relates to the practice of diplomacy, how diplomatic service and writing both require the same aptitudes of perception, and how all of this came together in the service of Zionism and the state of Israel.

Musical selections in this podcast are drawn from the Quintet for Clarinet and Strings, op. 31a, composed by Paul Ben-Haim and performed by the ARC Ensemble.

This podcast was recorded over Zoom at a virtual event for members of the Tikvah-Beren Collegiate Forum. You can learn more about the Forum here.

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0	If you followed the career of Michael Oren, you very likely know him as Israel's ambassador
0:13.5	to the United States during the Obama years.
0:16.2	Of course, there's also Michael Oren, the historian, the author of the best book on The Six-Day War,
0:22.0	as well as other studies of Israel, the Middle East, and the U.S.-Israel relationship.
0:26.4	Orin's worked at think tanks, he's been a professor at Ivy League institutions,
0:31.2	he served in the Knesset and in the Israeli government, and with the recent publication of
0:36.3	the Knight Archer. he returns to another genre
0:39.0	with another volume of fiction.
0:41.1	How do all these things fit together in the mind of Michael Oren?
0:44.7	Welcome to the Tikva podcast.
0:46.3	I'm your host, Jonathan Silver.
0:48.0	This week, I'm joined by Israel's former ambassador to the United States from his home in Jaffa
0:53.0	for a discussion about how fiction relates to the writing of history his home in Jaffa, for a discussion about how fiction
0:55.1	relates to the writing of history, how the study of history relates to diplomacy, and how
1:00.3	diplomatic service and writing both require the same aptitudes of perception, of inhabiting
1:06.6	the interests and orientation of someone else, and how, in Oren's career, all this came together
1:11.9	in the service of Zionism and the state of Israel.
1:15.0	If you enjoy this conversation, you can subscribe to the Tikva podcast on iTunes, Stitcher,
1:19.6	Google Play, and Spotify.
1:21.1	I hope you'll leave us a five-star review to help us grow this community of ideas.
1:25.8	I welcome your feedback on this or any of our other podcast episodes at podcast at
1:30.7	tikfafund.org.
	...

Please login to see the full transcript.

Previous episode | Next episode

Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from Tikvah, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.

Generated transcripts are the property of Tikvah and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.