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For Herzl the impulse to write his futuristic novel came after his short visit to Palestine in 1898. He wanted to
call the novel The New Zion, but changed its title to Altneuland after recalling the name of the famous Prague synagogue Altneuschul.

 

   Epilogue of  Oldnewland

by Theodor Herzl

1902
 

... But if you do not will it, it is and will remain a fairy-tale, this story that I have told you.

I meant it to be a fairy-tale with a moral. More fairy-tale than moral, some critics will say. And others - More moral than tale!

For now, dear book, after three years of work, we must part - and your path of sorrows is before you. You will have to make your way through hostility and misrepresentation, as through a dark, evil forest.

But if you meet kindly people, my child, greet them in the name of your father. He believes that dreaming is as good a way of spending our time on this earth as any other, and dream and action are not so far apart as is often thought. All the activity of mankind was a dream once - and will again be a dream.
 
 

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