During 1975, the year in which Humboldt's Gift drew such mixed responses, Bellow married Alexandra Ionescu Tulcea, and spent three months in Israel while she lectured in mathematics at Hebrew University. Bellow put the time to good use by researching a chronological documentary of the trip which he published as To Jerusalem and Back (1976). It is a book in which he remains neutral on the Arab-Israeli issue, but in which he shows both ambivalence about, and empathy for, the Jewish state. He read many articles and books on Israel and interviewed many Jewish government leaders. The book combines firsthand accounts of many of these interviews, a somewhat journalistic chronology of his stay, fictional stories, reported conversations, travelogue, bits of essays, and pieces of public addresses. It earned for Bellow the label of "neoconservative," and a number of negative reviews. According to some critics, he did not interview enough people involved in the arts, medicine, science, civic projects, or religious groups. Others complained about his political neutrality, and his apparent lack of understanding of the history of Zionism, Israel, Islam, and world politics. Some wanted to know just who he had talked with, while still others thought the book passionate, cerebral, and yet lacking a unifying vision and commitment. Bellow comments in the book on how hard he finds it as a Westerner to come to any clear vision of things--about how his intermittent wakefulness is often followed by loss of focus. Readers of Bellow's novels have long realized that this is the very predicament of most of his heroes, the recently-conceived Charlie Citrine in particular. Few of them could be accused of specific commitment and unitary vision. It was during this spate of mixed reviews on Humboldt's Gift and on To Jerusalem and Back in 1976 that Bellow went to Sweden to receive the Nobel Prize for Literature, and to receive encomiums that should have assured him of an international audience of admirers.