Benjamin Ivry is a frequent Forward contributor.
Benjamin Ivry
By Benjamin Ivry
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Culture A new Holocaust opera premieres — in Thailand
Thailand might not seem the most probable point of origin for a new opera about the Holocaust, but on January 16, the world premiere of “Helena Citrónová” by the composer Somtow Sucharitkul, 67, will be staged in Bangkok. It is about a real-life Auschwitz survivor of Slovak Jewish origin who at a trial in 1972,…
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Culture Remembering The Ultimate Jewish Polymath — Jonathan Miller
Jonathan Wolfe Miller, the English Jewish author, stage director, and medical doctor, who died on November 27 at age 85, proved that issues of identity can transcend conscious denials. During youthful appearances in the influential satirical review “Beyond the Fringe,” Miller played a character who announced: “I’m not really a Jew, you know, just Jew-ish.”…
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Culture In Asia, A Mania For Kafka
On October 26, an “Unfolding Kafka Festival” featuring art installations, dance performances and film screenings, will open in Bangkok and Chiang Mai, Thailand. It is the third such biennial festival organized and directed by the Thai choreographer Jitti Chompee, marking a further advance of the Prague-born Jewish writer in Asia. Among its offerings is a…
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Culture On Her 100th Birthday, Doris Lessing And The Jews
Doris Lessing, who died on November 17, 2013 at age 94, won the 2007 Nobel Prize in Literature for her prolific writings ranging from autobiography to what she called “space fiction.” Sometimes overlooked was the lasting inspiration which Lessing, born Doris May Tayler in 1919 in Persia, drew from Jews and Jewish heritage. In 1925,…
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Culture Remembering Harold Bloom — Lover Of Literature, Defender Of The Western Canon
Harold Bloom, the American Jewish literary critic, has died at the age of 89. During his extremely prolific career, his audience was split between adulation and obloquy. His landmark books speak for themselves, including “The Anxiety of Influence” (1973),, “A Map of Misreading” (1975), “Agon (1982), “Ruin the Sacred Truths: Poetry and Belief from the…
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Culture Ingrid Bergman’s Lifelong Love Affair With the Jews
Ingrid Bergman, who would have turned 104 today, August 29, is cherished by film fans, especially for playing two foes of the Nazis: Ilsa Lund in “Casablanca” and Alicia Huberman in Alfred Hitchcock’s “Notorious.” Her late-career incarnation as Golda Meir in the 1982 TV film “A Woman Called Golda” surprised some viewers. Yet her own…
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Culture Remembering Sasson Somekh, Who Insisted On Arab Literature’s Place In Israel
Editor’s note: This piece was originally published on September 22, 2012. It was republished on August 19, 2019 after Sasson Somekh’s death at age 86. Translations have the potential to communicate one culture to another, strengthening humanistic ties. Translators can be peacemakers, self-abnegatingly finding compromises in the perilous confrontation of languages. No one exemplified this…
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Culture He Costumed The Great Jewish Films Of The 20th Century — Including Some That Were Never Made
The Oscar-winning Italian costume designer Piero Tosi, who died on August 10 at age 92, proved that even the most storied showbiz careers can include unrealized projects that provide a tantalizing glimpse at lost opportunities. The Florence-born Tosi, once described by the essayist Alberto Arbasino as “modest to a pathological level,” had much to be…
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