Benjamin Ivry is a frequent Forward contributor.
Benjamin Ivry
By Benjamin Ivry
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Culture Jerusalem Cinematheque and Film Festival Founder Lia Van Leer Dies at 90
Lia van Leer, who died on March 13 at age 90, was a mighty pioneer who ensured that future generations in Israel will appreciate film as an art form. Founder of the Haifa Cinematheque, the Jerusalem Cinematheque, the Israel Film Archive and the Jerusalem Film Festival, she was born Lia Greenberg in the Russian-speaking Bessarabian…
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Culture Documenting the Life of Documentary Filmmaker Albert Maysles
The American Jewish filmmaker Albert Maysles, who died on March 6 at age 88, received the National Medal of Arts in 2014 for his celebrated documentaries on the Beatles; the Rolling Stones; and the reclusive relatives of Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis in “Grey Gardens.” Yet arguably, the most enduring inspiration for Maysles’s artistry was from Yiddishkeit….
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Culture How the Golem Got His Groove Back
This year marks the centenary of the book publication of Gustav Meyrink’s serialized novel “Der Golem.” Until a 2006 episode of TV’s “The Simpsons,” where Bart Simpson stole a golem from Krusty the Clown, Meyrink’s was probably the most famous adaptation of the ancient Jewish legend in which a man of clay is brought to…
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Culture Irving Kahn, Oldest Money Manager, Dies at 109
Irving Kahn, the American Jewish money manager who died on Thursday, February 26, at age the age of 109, was more than just the oldest living investment professional, as he was often dubbed. Kahn exemplified a work ethic which stressed ever-fresh intellectual interests as a way to remain young in spirit. Always on the lookout…
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Culture How Marvin Miller Led Players Union and Changed Baseball Forever
Marvin Miller, Baseball Revolutionary By Robert F. Burk University of Illinois Press, 352 pages, $35 This stately, well-researched study raises the question of which is more enduring, anti-Semitic hatred or the loathing — even after death — felt by plutocrats forced against their will to treat their workers fairly. Robert F. Burk, an emeritus professor…
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The Schmooze Lesley Gore’s Defiant Jewish Voice Stilled
Lesley Gore, the singer best known for ‘It’s My Party,’ has died after a battle with lung cancer. Benjamin Ivry took a look back in 2010 at her very Jewish career. From her earliest hits, like 1964’s defiant “You Don’t Own Me,” Gore was at once independent, self-assured, and linguistically gifted, as evidenced by her…
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Culture Philip Levine Was Working-Class Poet Inspired by Yiddishkeit
Philip Levine, the Jewish poet who died on February 14 at age 87, was a feisty writer inspired by working class roots and a family tradition of bubbe-meises (grandmother’s fables). In “Jewish American Poetry: Poems, Commentary, and Reflections” (2000) Levine analysed his poem “The Old Testament”: “My twin brother swears that at age thirteen I’d…
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Culture Was Helmut Schmidt ‘Contaminated by Nazi Ideology’
● Helmut Schmidt and the Crap War: the Biography from 1918 to 1945 By Sabine Pamperrien Piper Verlag, 352 pages, $25.36 Born in 1918, Helmut Schmidt, who served as chancellor of West Germany from 1974 to 1982, has been enjoying cultural prestige in his old age, in part for having recorded works by Bach and…
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In Case You Missed It
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Yiddish אַ מוצאי־שבת אין פּאָרטלאַנד, אַ קאַצנשפּרונג פֿונעם „אײַס“־בניןA Saturday night in Portland, very close to the ICE building
שלום בערגער האָט גערעדט סײַ מיט די דעמאָנסטראַנטן קעגן „אײַס“ סײַ מיט די „טראָמפּיסטן“
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Fast Forward Cuomo dominates Jewish vote in final Quinnipiac poll before election
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Fast Forward ADL removes ‘Protect Civil Rights’ from website as it narrows its mission amid right-wing attacks
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Yiddish צי זאָל איך ווערן אַ ראַבינער?So should I become a rabbi?
אַן אַקאַדעמיקער באַשרײַבט זײַן איבערלעבונג אויף אַ רעטריט פֿאָקוסירט אויפֿן אינספּירירן ייִדן צו ווערן גײַסטיקע פֿירער.
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