Tel Aviv was the first Hebrew City. Before 1909 there was nothing, today, it is the biggest metropolis in Israel.
Azaryahu shows the development of Tel Aviv from a sand dune to a skyscraper-studded megalopolis. He blends wonderful creative stories and characters as he focuses on periods and places and takes the reader on a walking tour through the past 100 years. He looks at some of the great characters and leaders of the city, like Tel Aviv’s first mayor, Meir Dizengoff, and the poet laureate of Israel, Hayyim Nachman Bialik.
This remarkable book explores a city with so much and such varied character that is has earned a wide variety of endearing nicknames. It is the City of White, the City of Wonders, the City of Oranges, and the Non-Stop City. It is Tel Aviv. It is a place where cultural centers and counter-culture hangouts co-exist.
Tel Aviv really is a microcosm of the Zionist experience; something created from nothing. It is a link with the past that is totally new. To quote the proud first mayor of the city, Tel Aviv is “the model of the national home.”