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Host Marcela Sulak reads the opening essay from Etgar Keret’s memoir The Seven Good Years, about the seven years between the birth of his son and the death of his father. Marcela also explains why, although Keret is Israeli, the book was never published in Hebrew nor released in Israel.

As Keret waits in the hospital for his wife to give birth, he’s surrounded by the victims of a terrorist attack that has just occurred, and is pestered by a journalist looking for an “original” reaction to the mass murder.

“Six hours later, a midget with a cable hanging from his belly button comes popping out of my wife’s vagina and immediately starts to cry. I try to calm him down, to convince him that there’s nothing to worry about. That by the time he grows up, everything here in the Middle East will be settled: peace will come, there won’t be any more terrorist attacks, and even if once in a blue moon there is one, there will always be someone original, someone with a little vision, around to describe it perfectly.”

The podcast features songs written by Keret, performed by the band Mouth and Foot. Tune in next week for “Part II,” in which Marcela reads another extract from the memoir – this time about the Keret household’s reaction to the threat of an Iranian nuke.

Listen to Part II of our dip into Keret’s memoir, in which Marcela reads an essay called “Bombs Away.”

Text:
The Seven Good Years. Translated by Sondra Silverston, Miriam Shlesinger, Jessica Cohen, and Anthony Berris. New York: Riverhead Books, 2015.

Further reading:
Suddenly, a Knock on the Door
The Girl on the Fridge
Missing Kissinger
The Nimrod Flipout
The Bus Driver Who Wanted to Be God & Other Stories

Music:
Hape Vehatlapayim (Mouth and Foot) – Anonimi
Eviatar Banai – Hamon Anashim

Producer: Laragh Widdess
Technical producer: Alex Benish