Talya Zax is the Forward’s opinion editor. Contact her at [email protected] or on Twitter, @TalyaZax.
Talya ZaxOpinion Editor
By Talya Zax
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Culture When Chagall Battled For Russia’s Soul
When it was over and done with, perhaps the main thing that stood out about the Soviet Union was its success in restricting the character of its citizens. As Masha Gessen wrote in her 2016 book “The Future is History,” in every totalitarian state “The shaping of the New Man is the regime’s explicit project.”…
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Film & TV Jerome Robbins Was The Quintessential Jewish American Genius
On May 6, 1953, Jerome Robbins was front-page news in the Forward for an act that would haunt him for the rest of his life. An above-the-fold headline — published next to an unrelated photo of a handsome young harbor boss named Francis Kelly, who appeared to be wearing lipstick — read “Acclaimed Dancer Gives…
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Culture Salman Rushdie Talks Philip Roth, Mel Brooks And Bagels
Salman Rushdie is on the phone, and there is much I’d like to ask. For starters: Did Bob Dylan deserve the Nobel? On second thought, maybe better to go with the old Forward standard: What’s your favorite bagel? After all, Rushdie is aware that the truth of a character often lies in the details. That…
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Culture Anne Frank Was Remarkable. The Graphic Adaptation Of Her Diary Masks Her Brilliance.
ANNE FRANK’S DIARY: THE GRAPHIC ADAPTATION Adapted by Ari Folman Illustrated by David Polonsky Pantheon, 160 pages, $24.95 When I think of what Anne Frank looked like, I think of her eyes. In photographs they are deep-set and transparent, thoughtful and often joyful. Looks deceive, but in Frank’s gaze it is possible to locate the…
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Culture Q & A: Rebecca Traister On Women’s Rage
Rebecca Traister and I spoke about women’s anger on an angry day, during an exceptionally angry week. It was the last Tuesday in September. The evening before, in the wake of the Deborah Ramirez’s allegation that Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh had exposed himself to her, Kavanaugh and his wife, Ashley Estes Kavanaugh, had given…
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Culture Memo To A Sexist Editor: You Are Not A Martyr
In Ian Buruma’s eyes, there is something cruelly ironic about the circumstances of his departure from the New York Review of Books. As the broadsheet’s editor-in-chief, he had published Jian Ghomeshi’s essay “Reflections from a Hashtag,” in which a man accused by over 20 women of sexual assault meditated on how social media scorn had…
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Culture Q & A: Norm Eisen Is Leading The Legal Charge Against Trump —And Bringing Prague’s 20th-Century To Life
Among the many oddities of the President Trump years is the extent to which relatively obscure government officials — the kind who, in any other administration, would barely register in the public consciousness — have become subjects of fascination. Hubbubs have been made over the many civil servants who have conscientiously resigned, often through the…
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Culture Eichmann’s Capture Created Dangerous Myths. ‘Operation Finale’ Makes Them Worse.
In a telling scene in “Operation Finale” — the new blockbuster dramatization of Israel’s 1960 capture of Nazi architect of the Final Solution Adolf Eichmann — Mossad operatives are in a bar, drinking, smoking and looking somber. The group has a resident hothead, a staple of the espionage genre, who insists that each team member…
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