Never Alone
Prison, Politics, and My People
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- $19.99
Publisher Description
A classic account of courage, integrity, and most of all, belonging
In 1977, Natan Sharansky, a leading activist in the democratic dissident movement in the Soviet Union and the movement for free Jewish emigration, was arrested by the KGB. He spent nine years as a political prisoner, convicted of treason against the state. Every day, Sharansky fought for individual freedom in the face of overt tyranny, a struggle that would come to define the rest of his life.
Never Alone reveals how Sharansky's years in prison, many spent in harsh solitary confinement, prepared him for a very public life after his release. As an Israeli politician and the head of the Jewish Agency, Sharansky brought extraordinary moral clarity and uncompromising, often uncomfortable, honesty. His story is suffused with reflections from his time as a political prisoner, from his seat at the table as history unfolded in Israel and the Middle East, and from his passionate efforts to unite the Jewish people.
Written with frankness, affection, and humor, the book offers us profound insights from a man who embraced the essential human struggle: to find his own voice, his own faith, and the people to whom he could belong.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
In this inspirational account, Soviet dissident Sharansky (Defending Identity) chronicles his life story and offers his perspective on the evolving relationship between the state of Israel and the Jewish people. In the book's strongest sections, Sharansky describes growing up in Ukraine under Stalinist rule, where "being outed as Jewish was like being diagnosed with some debilitating disease." He learned the art of "doublethink," publicly professing allegiance to the regime while harboring private doubts, and fully embraced his Jewish heritage after Israel's victory in the Six-Day War. In 1973, Soviet authorities denied his request to emigrate to Israel. He joined the "Refusenik" and democratic dissident movements, was surveilled and arrested by the KGB on trumped-up treason charges, and served nine years in the gulag before international outcry led to his release. Arriving in Israel in 1986 at age 38, Sharansky cofounded a new Russian immigrants' political party and became head of the Jewish Agency for Israel. He forcefully articulates his center-right political views, including opposition to the Oslo peace accords, and defends Trump administration policies on Israel while condemning the president's "moral dithering" after a neo-Nazi rally in Charlottesville, Va. The result is a worthy introduction to the life and work of one of the world's most famous political prisoners.
