Book excerpt: "A brilliant treatment of the major intellectual leader of Zionism. . . . The book is written in an uncommonly lucid, even graceful style [and] investigates the history of modern Jewry with unprecedented depth and insight."--Arnold Band, University of California, Los Angeles "I am very grateful for Steven Zipperstein's book about Ahad Ha'am. I have learned a great deal from its historical scholarship and intellectual lucidity."--Irving Howe, author of "World of Our Fathers" "Zipperstein, already well known as the historian of the Jews of Odessa, has now written a thoroughly erudite but deeply personal biography of one their greatest sons. . . . This first-rate study of his life and work makes for absorbing reading, with an all too contemporary relevance."--Joseph Frank, Stanford University