This is the Forward’s coverage of Jewish culture where you’ll learn about the latest (and sometimes earliest) in Jewish art, music (including of course Bob Dylan and Leonard Cohen), film, theater, books as well as the secret Jewish history of…
Culture
-
The Peculiarly Jewish Predicament
Little Men: Novellas and Stories By Gerald Shapiro Columbus Ohio State University Press, 219 pages, $29.95. * * *| ‘Just tell me — is it good for the Jews?” The precariousness of Diaspora existence got turned against Philip Roth when “Goodbye Columbus and Other Stories” (1958) seemed to betray nasty Jewish foibles to America’s goyim….
-
Setting Yiddishkeit To Mambo, Metal And Surf
Meshugga Beach Party: Sixteen Songs of the Chosen Surfers (Halakahiki Records) The Makkabees: Volume Aleph (self-released) Yiddishe Cup: Meshugeneh Mambo (Yiddishe Cup) * * *| There are some who believe that authentic Jewish genius lies in the moral and legal codes of our ancestors; others, in the monotheistic impulse, or in the faith that sustained…
-
Waters of Contention
Not long ago, I would have told you that the odds of my ever visiting a mikveh were approximately the same as those of George Bush tongue-kissing Dick Cheney. The mikveh always was an aspect of traditional Judaism I was uncomfortable with. I understand that my perspective isn’t shared by all women, and to those…
The Latest
-
NOVEL JEWS
“Novel Jews” is a downtown reading series in New York that presents provocative and enlightening fiction and literary nonfiction by both today’s literary superstars and the emerging voices of tomorrow. The reading is co-sponsored by The Sol Goldman 14th Street Y, the JCC in Manhattan and the Forward. WHEN: Wednesday, November 10, 7 p.m. –…
-
Spiritual Hunger Artists
Joy Comes in the Morning By Jonathan Rosen Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 400 pages, $25. —— Jonathan Rosen came to wide public attention, first as the editor (for some 10 years) of this newspaper’s highly regarded Arts & Letters section, and then as the author of “Eve’s Apple” (Random House Inc., l997), an impressive debut…
-
Bridging a Rift Between Israelis and Americans
Outside a velvet rope on a recent fall evening last month, three dark-haired men tossed their cigarettes, passed a security check and queued up to pay a cover charge. They were chatting in Hebrew about a hot new software program as they entered the club, where a celebrity D.J. dubbed “Van Jee” was spinning tunes…
-
A Dutch Author Relishes the Spectacle
Story of My Baldness By Marek van der Jagt Other Press, 264 pages, $22. —— Phantom Pain By Arnon Grunberg Other Press, 286 pages, $22. —— In Arnon Grunberg’s novel “Story of My Baldness,” which has just been released in English translation, the Dutch novelist adopted a new literary persona: Marek van der Jagt, as…
-
FALL BOOKS
Letters 1928-1946: Isaiah Berlin Edited by Henry Hardy Cambridge University Press, 755 pages, $40. ——- A couple of years ago, while visiting the offices of The Atlantic Monthly, I commented on my admiration of Isaiah Berlin to a friend of mine, Cullen Murphy, the magazine’s executive editor. Few modern thinkers strike me as being as…
-
FALL BOOKS
A Pretext for War: 9/11, Iraq, and the Abuse of America’s Intelligence Agencies By James Bamford Doubleday, 420 pages, $26.95. * * *| This past August, the news broke of an FBI probe into a possible leak to Israel of classified intelligence information via the pro-Israel lobby, the American Israel Public Affairs Committee. The leak…
-
Gleanings
One in a series of occasional excerpts from books that catch our eye. The following is an excerpt from “Ballad of the Whiskey Robber: A True Story of Bank Heists, Ice Hockey, Transylvanian Pelt-Smuggling, Moonlighting Detectives, and Broken Hearts,” by Julian Rubinstein (Little, Brown). In it, Rubinstein offers a hilarious account of crime in the…
-
FALL BOOKS
Shanda: The Making and Breaking of a Self-Loathing Jew By Neal Karlen Touchstone, 224 pages, $23. ——— Self-hatred can be fun — for other people, that is. That’s what Neal Karlen learned in college. He could use his profound Jewish self-loathing as a way of attracting mass quantities of shiksas at parties. While guitar-playing non-Jewish…
Explore
Most Popular
- 1
Opinion The Iran war ended terribly for the US, and even worse for Israel
- 2
Film & TV In ‘Disclosure Day,’ Steven Spielberg finds himself at odds with Jewish thought about aliens
- 3
Opinion Cultural boycotts of Israel just reached peak absurdity
- 4
Sports This year’s biggest World Cup upset came from its most Jew-ish team
In Case You Missed It
-
Fast Forward Years after a boycott fight, Ben & Jerry’s Israel debuts a flavor celebrating Israeli resilience
-
Fast Forward Mamdani calls AIPAC ‘monsters’ in rally ahead of NY primaries
-
Fast Forward Jewish groups push back against Trump’s Iran deal — but more quietly so far than in 2015
-
News Who is Gadi Eisenkot, the Israeli politician who could dethrone Netanyahu?