Sally Rooney’s latest book will be translated into Hebrew and published by an independent press in Israel that supports Palestinian rights.
November Books will release the Irish author’s novel Intermezzo, translated into Hebrew by Debbie Eylon, according to a news release. Rooney’s novel, published in the U.S. in 2024 by Farrar, Straus and Giroux, tells the story of two brothers navigating their relationship after their father dies. A critic for Kirkus wrote of the book, “Though not perfect, a clear leap forward for Rooney; her grandmaster status remains intact.”
Rooney’s first two books, Conversations With Friends and Normal People, were translated into Hebrew and published by Modan Publishing House in Israel, but in 2021 she said that her novel Beautiful World, Where Are You would not be translated into the language or published there. “I simply do not feel it would be right for me under the present circumstances to accept a new contract with an Israeli company that does not publicly distance itself from apartheid and support the U.N.-stipulated rights of the Palestinian people,” Rooney said.
November Books, which, like Rooney, supports the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) movement—a campaign that seeks to economically pressure Israel to withdraw from the occupied territories and guarantee the rights of Palestinians—will publish the Hebrew-language edition of Intermezzo in connection with the media outlets +972 Magazine and Local Call. The Guardian reports that the book will be published later this month.
“For me, the act of translation is in itself a beautiful ideal,” Rooney told the Guardian. “Though my refusal to work with complicit Israeli publishing houses made the contractual side of things more complex, I was, of course, never boycotting the Hebrew language or any language.”
Rooney has been an outspoken supporter of Palestinian rights for many years. Last September, she said that she was unable to travel to the U.K. to accept a literary award out of concern she might be arrested due to her support for Palestine Action, an organization the British government has designated a terrorist group.
Michael Schaub is a contributing writer.
