Old New Land

<p> </p><p> <em>Old New Land </em>forever altered the face of the Middle East. The book was a nineteenth-century utopian blueprint for a modern state of Israel. There were Jewish settlers in Palestine and Zionist ideas had existed in Eastern Europe before Herzl but Herzl made Zionism into a cultural and political movement acceptable to Western governments and intellectuals. His prophecy at the end of this book became reality: “If you will it it is not a fable.” </p><p>The author founder of the Zionist movement considered this utopian story his best literary work: an expression of his art with a political message. His biographer Amos Elon placed <em>Old New Land </em>“in the mainstream of fin-de-siècle art. Its pursuit of arcadian bliss within a mystic community and its haunted preoccupation with dreams recall Gustav Mahler’s music.” </p>