Benjamin Ivry is a frequent Forward contributor.
Benjamin Ivry
By Benjamin Ivry
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The Schmooze Arnold Schoenberg, Zionist
Danielle Cohen-Levinas, married to Michaël Levinas, the composer-pianist son of French Jewish philosopher Emanuel Levinas, is ideally placed to evaluate the Jewish inspiration of the composer Arnold Schoenberg. A professor of aesthetics at the University of Paris IV–Sorbonne, Cohen-Levinas has just produced a groundbreaking study, “Schoenberg’s Century” for Les éditions Hermann. In addition to editing…
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The Schmooze Who Is Sylvia? What Is She?
In February, the Chicago Tribune stopped printing the syndicated comic strip “Sylvia,” by Chicago-based artist Nicole Hollander, and cries of outrage echoed across Lake Michigan. The protesters included detective story author Sara Paretsky, who wrote to the Tribune: “There are precious few women cartoonists, and Nicole is the only one with a daily strip who…
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The Schmooze Ami Bouganim’s Flavorful Tales From Fès
Born in Essaouira, Morocco, Ami Bouganim moved as a child with his family to Casablanca. There, he grew up on a street named after two Moroccan Jewish victims of the Nazis, Félix and Max Guedj, before relocating to Israel as a teenager. His first book, from Paris’s Les éditions Jean-Claude Lattès, was 1981’s acclaimed “Tales…
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The Schmooze Jews and Bulls: A French Philosopher Defends the Corrida
When Jews try to fight bulls, the results can end in tears, but the simple desire to watch bullfights has a more ambiguous outcome, as proven by the latest book by the French Jewish philosopher Francis Wolff. An author of academic works on Aristotle and Socrates who teaches in Paris, Wolff should not be confused…
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The Schmooze Remembering Czernowitz
The far-flung commemorations of the centenary of the 1908 Yiddish language conference in Czernowitz, including a conference in December, 2009 at the Hebrew University in Jerusalem, continue to have repercussions today. The recent essay collection from Lexington Books, “Czernowitz at 100: The First Yiddish Language Conference in Historical Perspective” edited by Joshua Fogel and Kalman…
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The Schmooze Barak Marshall’s Dynamic Dance Mongering
Dance talent is not often inherited through the generations, as we have seen with the regularly slated reconstructions of works by ballet master Michel Fokine, when recreated by his French granddaughter Isabelle. One happy exception to this rule is Los Angeles-born choreographer Barak Marshall, son of the acclaimed Yemenite Israeli dancer, choreographer and musician Margalit…
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The Schmooze Sylvain Lévi: A Man Not For All Seasons?
Some heroes of Jewish history are better known for their deeds than for their personalities, like Sylvain Lévi, president of the Alliance israélite universelle until his death in 1935. A great expert on Eastern religion, literature and history, who co-authored a dictionary of Buddhism and taught Sanskrit at the Sorbonne, Lévi has been little remembered…
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The Schmooze Robert Badinter, Defender of Life and Liberty
Few CD companies might be expected to issue a four disc set of 30-year-old political speeches, but this is just what the enterprising small label Frémeaux & Associés has done with Robert Badinter’s 1981 French National Assembly oratory. Badinter, who appeared in the 2007 documentary “Being Jewish in France,” was Justice Minister in 1981, when…
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