Book, Israel in April[LS]

In the last of the four travel books he wrote, published in 1969 - the others were Black Cat in a Field of Snow, from 1941, about the United States, The Return of the Black Cat, from 1946, also about the United States, and Mexico, 1957 -, Erico maintains the literary procedure of the previous ones and writes a tasty logbook enriched with interviews and historical information. The trip itinerary, in the company of his wife Mafalda, includes visits to several cities and villages, kibbutzim, personalities, friends, universities and museums. Constantly reflecting on what he sees, Verissimo anticipates one of the central questions of post-Israel Semitism: will Judaism now cease to be a culture and become a civilization - destined, like all civilizations, for a period of winter, old age and death? Will a possible decadence of the civilization of the new Zionist State [...] kill Jewish culture? Erico bets not, convinced that the Jewish diaspora will never cease to exist.