The Glory
Authors: Herman Wouk
Tags: #Literature & Fiction, #Genre Fiction, #Historical, #Jewish, #World Literature, #Historical Fiction
Copyright © 1994 by Herman Wouk
All rights reserved. Except as permitted under the U.S. Copyright Act of 1976, no part of this publication may be reproduced,
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permission of the publisher.
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The Glory
is a work of fiction set in a background of history. Israeli and other public personages both living and dead appear in the
story under their right names. Their portraits are offered as essentially truthful, though scenes and dialogue involving them
with fictitious characters are of course invented. Any other usage of real people’s names is coincidental. Any resemblance
of the imaginary characters to actual persons living or dead is unintended and fortuitous. The simplified map, of a region
much subject to clouded boundary disputes, is intended only to illustrate the narrative. Further clarification of certain
distinctions between fact and fancy appears in the Historical Notes at the end of this volume.
ISBN: 978-0-316-06889-5
Contents
20: The Third Temple Is Falling
Epilogue: “And He Shall Reign”
The Hope
“Heroic storytelling. … Wouk’s fictional characters humanize history.”
—Washington Post Book World
“It was given to Wouk, probably by the spirit of Tolstoy, to provide us in
The Winds of War
and
War and Remembrance
with the most convincing fictional transformation of World War II. He has done the same thing here for the struggles of the
infant state of Israel. …
The Hope
is moving, informative, ultimately a glorification of man’s possibilities. It is in this new country of Israel — where the
values of the citizen are the values of the family, where the soldier is also a scholar — that modern man has the most hope.
The title is apt, the book is magnificent.”
— Anthony Burgess
“Herman Wouk is a master of the historical novel.”
—Los Angeles Times
The Glory
“Superb. … A stirring novel of a brave period and place. … There is historical scope in
The Glory
that conveys indelibly the sense of history that dignifies the past and sustains the present.”
—Washington Times
“Wouk long ago proved his skill at the delicate balancing act which is the historical novel. … He has said that his mission
in writing
The Hope
and
The Glory
is to give ‘a vivid sense of what it was like to live in that embattled little land’ when these historical events were taking
place: he accomplishes what he set out to do, and earns the fireworks that grace his final pages.”
—Erica Wagner, The Times
(London)
Books by Herman Wouk
Novels
AURORA DAWN
CITY BOY
THE CAINE MUTINY
MARJORIE MORNINGSTAR
YOUNGBLOOD HAWKE
DON’T STOP THE CARNIVAL
THE WINDS OF WAR
WAR AND REMEMBRANCE
INSIDE, OUTSIDE
THE HOPE
THE GLORY
Plays
THE TRAITOR
THE CAINE MUTINY COURT-MARTIAL
NATURES WAY
Nonfiction
THIS IS MY GOD
THE WILL TO LIVE ON
To
THE ISRAELIS
Valorous in War
Generous in Peace
Above All to Those Who Fell
To Save the Land
The Glory
is in essence the historical novel that I first set out to write, about the beginnings of the reborn Jewish State in the
Holy Land. The Yom Kippur War of 1973, I thought, epitomized the drama of Israel’s struggle to live on: the surprise two-front
attack on its most sacred day, the Russian superpower’s grim backing of the Arab assault, the uphill fight against huge odds
in manpower and arms, and the stunning turnaround victory that broke the encircling Arab front and brought a peace treaty
with Egypt.
Mortal combat on the battlefield, high drama in the diplomatic arena, just the substance for a historical novel; that was
how I presented my project to an old Israeli friend, a retired major general who had known command in the field and advocacy
in Washington. He heard me out, then commented with weary good will, “Don’t try to do it in one war. It’s a hundred-year story.”
He was partly right. I did have to write an entire novel of equal length,
The Hope
, to set the stage of the Yom Kippur drama.
There is really no understanding Israel’s formative years — or even the current violence as I write, in March 2002 — without
factoring in the hostility to the Jewish State of the now-defunct Soviet Union, especially after the Six-Day War of 1967.
If not for Russia’s implacable fight at the United Nations to cancel and even reverse the outcome of that astounding victory,
the history of the Middle East might have taken a different course. The region might now be at peace.
The first hundred pages of
The Glory
throw a clear light on what happened then. The United States and Israel agreed to hard-fought exact wording of a U.N. resolution
calling for withdrawal of all parties
from territories occupied during the war
. Kosygin tried and failed to insert what he referred to as two little words, i.e.,
from
ALL THE
territories occupied during the war
. The harsh showdown between Lyndon Johnson and Alexsey Kosygin over the “two little words” embodies the crux of that era.
Those “two little words” are current coin in journalism, even as they climax my hundred pages. With the all-out backing of
the Soviet Union, the Arab nations were emboldened to fight on to eradicate Israel, and the signal of that decision was the
battle scene that opens
The Glory
, the sinking of the destroyer
Eilat
during the armistice that ended the war.
Part of the fascination of the Yom Kippur War — and I confess to a fascination with that seesaw conflict on the battlefield
and in the corridors of power, with its ramifications through Moscow, Cairo, Jerusalem, and Washington — part of the fascination,
I say, lies in the figure of the Egyptian leader, Anwar Sadat. Arguably the greatest Arab of modern times, Sadat planned and
executed the surprise attack with canny brilliance, then journeyed to Jerusalem to make peace with Israel. Golda Meir, when
asked who was the hero of the war, sharply rejoined, “Sadat! He dared.” Egypt still celebrates the day Sadat’s war started,
naming bridges, avenues, and monuments “October 6th.”
During my years of research, much of it done in Israel, I was asked innumerable times, “How will you end the story?” For the
end was not in sight when I started my work in the 1980s, any more than it is today in 2002. The illusory Oslo “peace process”
has foundered. In the changed world scene after the horrific events of September 11, Israel still contends with ongoing terrorist
incursions and stands alert against missile threats from a distance. Yet world perceptions of Israel’s long struggle with
the global evil of terrorism has been changing. I see hope for both sides in this change; and as for glory, Israel’s history
demonstrates how readily it will trade battlefield glory for true peace, as it did with Anwar Sadat.
The history of the military and diplomatic struggles in
The Hope
and
The Glory
is offered as accurate, based on years of arduous research. Where imaginary figures take part in actual historical scenes,
the Historical Notes in the back of each volume clarify what is real and what invented. A wise old Israeli, who helped me
greatly in my research, exclaimed on reading some early chapters, “Oh, you’re not going to make it an army story, are you?
There’s so much more to Israel than the army!” True enough. But life and death for Israel in those days hung on the army and
on the diplomats. A simple rule for the reader to bear in mind is this: aside from the four fictitious protagonists, Israeli
political figures, diplomatic characters, and military persons of the rank of lieutenant colonel and above are real people
of the time.
Herman Wouk
March 2002
The Barak (Berkowitz) family
Z
EV
B
ARAK
, born in Vienna, name Hebraized from Wolfgang Berkowitz. Army field officer, military emissary to America, later military
attaché in Washington
Nakhama, his wife
Noah, his son, in love with Daphna Luria
Galia, his daughter
Ruti, his daughter
John Barkowe (Berkowitz), nickname Jackie (“Dzecki”). American cousin of Noah, making aliya. In love with Daphna Luria
Leon Barkowe, his father
Bessie Barkowe, his mother
Michael Berkowitz, Zev’s religious brother, a scientist
Lena Berkowitz, Michael’s irreligious wife
Reuven, their son
Julia Levinson, French girl, later Noah’s wife
The Pasternak family
S
AM
P
ASTERNAK
, born in Czechoslovakia. Kibbutznik, combat officer, later in military procurement and the Mossad
Amos, his son
The Luria family
B
ENNY
L
URIA
, Sabra, born in Moshe Dayan’s moshav. Air Force commander
Irit, his wife
Yael, his sister (Yossi Nitzan’s wife)
Daphna, his daughter
Dov, his son
Danny, his son
Nitzan (Blumenthal) family
Y
OSSI
N
ITZAN
, combat officer, born Joseph Blumenthal in Poland (nickname Don Kishote)
Yael (Luria) Nitzan, his wife
Aryeh, their son
Leopold, Yossi’s brother (emigrates from Israel to America, changes name to Lee Bloom)
Shayna Matisdorf, Yossi’s first love, later marries Michael Berkowitz
The Cunningham family (American)
C
HRISTIAN
C
UNNINGHAM
, a CIA officer
Emily, his daughter
Bradford Halliday, army officer, Emily’s husband
The world is stunned. The eternal victims of history, the Jews, have risen in a single generation from the ashes of the Holocaust
to win, in six swift days of June 1967, the greatest military victory since the Second World War
.
In the West the media stammer astonished admiration. In Communist and Arab countries they rage against aggressive Israel and
claim that American carrier planes took part in the air strikes. In the United Nations the Soviet Union leads a bitter fight
to reverse the victory politically and force the Israelis back behind the old armistice lines of 1949. But various withdrawal
proposals worked up by the Russians and the Americans are rejected one after another by the Arab governments, who in August
have met in the capital of the Sudan and issued the Khartoum Declaration, embodying irrevocable
NO’S
—
NO
negotiation with Israel,
NO
recognition of Israel,
NO
peace with Israel.