Benjamin Ivry is a frequent Forward contributor.
Benjamin Ivry
By Benjamin Ivry
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The Schmooze Amos Luzzatto’s Fictional View of Jews in Hectic Postwar Rome
Lovers of Jewish culture know about Italy’s Luzzatto family, including the 19th century theologian Samuel David Luzzatto, known as Shadal, and (by marriage) the prolific author and teacher Dante Lattes. Shadal’s great-great-grandson, Amos Luzzatto, has followed in the family tradition. Born in Rome in 1928, he spent the war years with his family in Jerusalem,…
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The Schmooze Nostalgia and Moderns on CD for Heritage Month
For background sounds to Jewish American Heritage Month, why not investigate some nostalgic treasures of Hebrew education from a half-century ago, available from Smithsonian Folkways, such as 1958’s “Israeli Children’s Songs” sung by New York native Miriam Ben-Ezra; or a charming 1955 lecture, “The Hebrew Language: Commentary and Readings” by Theodor Herzl Gaster, a UK-born…
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The Schmooze Arthur Hartmann Fiddled With Debussy
Star violinists are not usually known for modesty, but even in this company, Arthur Hartmann, born in Philadelphia to Hungarian-Jewish immigrants, stands out for braggadocio. Hartmann, who died in 1956, had talent, as we read in “Claude Debussy As I Knew Him and Other Writings of Arthur Hartmann,” a paperback out in September, 2010 from…
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The Schmooze A Scientist From the Overachieving Panofsky Family
The German-born Jewish physicist Wolfgang Panofsky confounds the general rule about offspring of geniuses being disappointments. Son of the eminent art historian Erwin Panofsky, Wolfgang was not just an accomplished scientist who made contributions to the Manhattan Project, but was also a delightfully witty man, as proven by a new paperback edition of his charming…
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The Schmooze Greta Garbo’s Gay Jewish ‘Svengali’
Greta Garbo, who died 21 years ago on April 15, is a permanent screen legend, as last year’s lavishly illustrated “Greta Garbo: The Mystery of Style” by Stefania Ricci from Skira Publishers, reminds us. Yet director Mauritz Stiller, who discovered Garbo and made her a star, remains an enigmatic figure, as “Nordic Exposures: Scandinavian Identities…
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Culture Piaf’s Paramour, and Much More
The French singer-songwriter Georges Moustaki (born Giuseppe “Yussef” Mustacchi, to a family of Greek Jews in Alexandria, Egypt) is still mainly remembered outside France for his brief, stormy love affair with Édith Piaf. Although Moustaki penned the lyrics for Piaf’s resounding 1959 hit “Milord,” the song’s raucous, honky-tonk aura is far from Moustaki’s own ruefully…
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The Schmooze The Fiery Prophet Who Named Jewish Self-Hatred
The German Jewish philosopher Theodor Lessing was a firebrand, author of profoundly unsettling books such as 1930’s “Jewish Self-Hatred” (Der jüdische Selbsthaß), a welcome new edition of which has just appeared from Agora from Presses Pocket in France. It’s translated and introduced by Maurice-Ruben Hayoun, a Germanist who teaches Jewish philosophy at the University of…
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The Schmooze ‘Dear Little Sister Cembalo,’ the Viennese Harpsichordist Alice Ehlers
While awaiting this year’s TCM Classic Film Festival in Hollywood from April 28 to May 1, the Turner Classic Movie channel broadcast William Wyler’s 1939 “Wuthering Heights,” starring Merle Oberon and Laurence Olivier. Cinema fans recall that in that film, during a party, Isabella Linton (Geraldine Fitzgerald) announces to Heathcliff (Olivier): “Oh, Madame Ehlers is…
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