A professor at the University of Houston, Robert Zaretsky is also a culture columnist at the Forward.
Robert Zaretsky
By Robert Zaretsky
-
Culture Resisting the Familiar Narrative of Resistance in France
How could anyone govern a country, Charles de Gaulle once asked, that has 240 different kinds of cheese? Less well known is the question he posed as leader of the Free French during World War II: How can anyone liberate a country that has nearly the same number of resistance movements? Okay, he didn’t really…
-
Opinion French Jews Need To Stand Up for Muslims Right Now
France discovered recently that Marine Le Pen, leader of the extreme right-wing Front National, has a kindred spirit. Her name is Nadine Morano. Like Le Pen, Morano is an immigrant-baiting and blunt-talking politician. A leading figure of the conservative Les Républicains, Morano is very close to the party’s leader, the once (and so he hopes)…
-
Opinion Can Dominique Strauss-Kahn Reinvent Himself — as France’s Next President?
While there are no second acts in American lives, as F. Scott Fitzgerald famously claimed, there seems to be a French exception. Over the past several weeks, Dominique Strauss-Kahn, the Jewish former French finance minister, former head of the International Monetary Fund, former front-runner for the French presidency, and former perp at Riker’s Island, has…
-
Culture Where All the Reasons To Kill Are Absurd
By Kamel Daoud, translated from the French by John Cullen Other Press, 160 Pages, $14.95 Kamel Daoud kick-starts his novel with the line “Mama’s still alive today,” turning inside out the celebrated opening of Albert Camus’s “The Stranger”: “Maman died today. Or yesterday maybe, I don’t know.” What would Camus say were he alive today,…
-
Opinion Jean Zay, Resistance Fighter and Cannes Founder, Enters the Pantheon
One could hardly conceive of a greater contrast between the resorts and runways at Cannes and the sepulchers and silence at the Pantheon. The Mediterranean town is the capital of glitter and celebrity, while the Parisian monument is the twilit-resting place for those whose lives brought glory to the nation. This year, however, the red…
-
Opinion It’s Not About Leaving France — Our Question Is How To Stay
“Is there a future for Jews in France?” I might just as well have poured a Dr Pepper into the wine glass of Nicolas Weill. The cultural and literary journalist for Le Monde looked at me from across our corner table in a small restaurant specializing in provincial fare. “This sort of question is an…
-
Opinion How France’s Le Pen Family Feud Is Manna From Far Right Wing Heaven
When I arrived in Paris last week for a research trip, little had changed from my many previous trips. Though spring, the weather was drizzly and cold; despite the economic crisis, charming stores displayed tempting breads and books; and notwithstanding the “défense de fumer” signs, café terraces were dense with cigarette smoke. And while Marine…
-
Culture The Novel France Can’t Put Down Depicts Muslim Future — Or Does It?
● Soumission By Michel Houellebecq French and European Publications Inc, 320 pages, $49.95 Though it pretends to be about France’s near future, Michel Houellebecq’s controversial “Soumission” is also about its recent past. Set in the year 2022, the novel portrays a country riven by conflicting ideologies and worldviews, teetering on the edge of civil war….
Explore
Most Popular
- 1
News Scoop: Heritage Foundation plans to ‘identify and target’ Wikipedia editors
- 2
Music For Bob Dylan’s biographer, ‘A Complete Unknown’ is a dream come true — even if it’s mostly fiction
- 3
Culture In Peter Yarrow’s legacy, an uneasy blend of Jewish values and personal transgressions
- 4
News ‘Do you have the Torahs?’ Synagogue races LA wildfire to rescue its past and future
In Case You Missed It
-
Fast Forward A rabbi and his son were arrested for vandalizing a swastika mural. Are they heroes or hooligans?
-
Opinion What a remarkable Torah rescued from Iran — then LA’s fire — can teach about community amid devastation
-
Fast Forward Israel’s judicial overhaul is back. So are the protests.
-
Opinion After 15 months of war, Israelis are all scaffolding, helping hold each other up
-
Shop the Forward Store
100% of profits support our journalism
