Benjamin Ivry is a frequent Forward contributor.
Benjamin Ivry
By Benjamin Ivry
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The Schmooze Amazing Jewish Racers Win ‘Amazing Race’
Although they will never displace the affection felt by old time radio fans for the 1940s radio comedian Minerva Pious, the Rhode Island-born Jewish brothers Daniel and Jordan Pious have been guaranteed their 15 minutes of fame. Yesterday it was announced that the Piouses won the $1 million top prize in the grueling CBS reality…
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The Schmooze ‘The Wandering Jew Has Arrived’: French Journalist Albert Londres Visits Tel Aviv
The great French journalist Albert Londres (1884-1932), whose subjects ranged from prison conditions to mental hospitals to the Sino-Japanese War, chose one of his most fascinating themes in “The Wandering Jew Has Arrived” (“Le juif errant est arrivé”), an on-the-spot account of a 1929 trip through Jewish neighborhoods in England, Eastern Europe, and Tel Aviv….
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The Schmooze One Thousand and One Nights: Too Jewish for Some Egyptians?
It was reported today that a group of Islamist lawyers in Egypt is calling for “The Arabian Nights,” also known as “One Thousand and One Nights,” to be banned as obscene. A new 3-volume translation of “Alf laila wa-laila” will coincidentally be published by Penguin Classics on May 25, complete with all of the time-honored…
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The Schmooze Clara Malraux: A Feisty Writer to Remember
The French Jewish writer Clara Malraux (1897-1982) deserves to be remembered for her two ardent, sadly untranslated, books on Israel, “Kibbutz Civilization” (“Civilisation du kibboutz,” 1964), and “From the Four Corners of the Earth: Twelve Israeli Encounters” (“Venus des quatre coins de la terre: douze rencontres en Israël,” 1971). Instead, as a stylish new biography…
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The Schmooze Alfred Hertz: A Conductor Who Tried Harder
Pristine Classical, the acclaimed historic recordings website, is honoring the German-born Jewish conductor Alfred Hertz with an ongoing reissue series, available both online and on CD. The reissues feature Hertz conducting the San Francisco Symphony in sprightly performances of Mendelssohn’s “A Midsummer Night’s Dream,” Brahms’s Hungarian Dances, and deft renditions of ballet music by Delibes….
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The Schmooze Clueless Clarice: Inspecting Lispector’s ‘Jewish Mysticism’
Last year “Why This World: A Biography of Clarice Lispector” (Oxford University Press) appeared to qualified praise. Readers and critics alike took issue with the biographer’s otiose portrait of Lispector as a Jewish mystic, even one of the tzaddikim, “bearers of that irrational something.” Lispector, originally named Chaya, was born to Pinkhas and Mania Krimgold…
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The Schmooze Danny the Red!: German Jewish Politician Daniel Cohn-Bendit Still in the Spotlight
An indelible memory of France’s 1968 social upheaval is the diminutive red-haired German Jew, Daniel Cohn-Bendit, nicknamed “Danny the Red,” popping up gleefully at student protests and shouting to the crowds. A sympathetic new biography by tabloid journalist Emeline Cazi, “The Real Cohn-Bendit” (“Le vrai Cohn-Bendit”) from Editions Plon, explains that Cohn-Bendit was born to…
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Culture Private Genius, Public Spotlight
A photography exhibit radiating quiet humanity, honoring the Lithuanian-Jewish photographer Izis, who was born Israëlis Bidermanas, is warming the City of Paris’s chilly official administration building, l’Hôtel de Ville. “Izis, Paris of Dreams” runs until May 29 and is a must-see for anyone visiting the city. A splendid catalog from Les Éditions Flammarion explains the…
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