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
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False Messiahs and Whirling Dervishes: A Scholar’s Fresh Take on an Old Topic
The Sabbatean Prophets By Matt Goldish Harvard University Press, 240 pages, $39.95. ——- The following dire, revolutionary proclamation issues forth from a charismatic provocateur in Gaza: “None will be saved from these tribulations except those dwelling in this place. The [very] name of the place [connoting strength] expresses her nature. And with the advent of…
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At 80, Lang Still Keeps the Flame Alive
Guests savored paprika chicken, dumplings, duck liver plus 80 cakes at the June 15 surprise 80th birthday party for George Lang thrown by his wife, Jennifer, daughter Gigi and son Simon. Held at the La Palestra gym — next door to the Café des Artistes, which Lang owns — there was room for Hungarian folk…
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New Look at False Messiah
well before Shabbetai Zevi’s total defection from Judaism. That latter catastrophe led to the deeper, antinomian apostasy of the later Jewish Sabbateans, as well as to the Donmeh, the school of Muslim believers in Shabbetai Zevi, which persists, very secretly, in Turkey today. Even in contemporary America, though limited to rather marginal Jewish circles, the…
The Latest
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July 9, 2004
100 YEARS AGO • Tragic news has arrived from Europe announcing the death of the leader of political Zionism, Dr. Theodore Herzl, from a heart attack. He was 44 years old. Herzl’s death is a terrible blow not only for Zionism, but also for millions of Jews who looked to him as a savior of…
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They Might Be Giants
In Our Hearts We Were Giants By Yehuda Koren and Eilat Negev Carroll & Graf, 305 pages, $25. —- Imagine the terror of a having a vicious German Shepherd bark at you on the train platform at Auschwitz. Now imagine that the dog is barking at you as your tiny body is lifted from a…
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Five ‘Fruity Jews’ Get Out the Vote
It is a beautiful summer Friday in Seattle’s University District, and Frances Kreimer, 21, is wrapped in a tallit, praying the morning service outside an international students’ dorm. Inside, challah is rising in the kitchen, and Kreimer’s four roommates are making preparations for the Sabbath. The five East Coast college students have come out West…
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Sealed Mit a Kiss: Yiddish Love Poems
Simkhe: epistolarishe libe-lider (Celebration: Love-letter Poems) By Troim Katz Handler, translated by Shimon Beyles International Association of Yiddish Clubs, 73 pages, $18. * * *| No one who has drunk from the cup of Sappho, much less from the bounty of today’s literary erotica, will blush over “Simkhe: epistolarishe libe-lider,” or “Celebration: Love-letter Poems,” by…
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First Fruit
‘Heartburn — raisins I don’t eat. Take mine.” Jed offers his packet of raisins to the young man in the window seat beside him. “Thanks,” Ron says, “I’m not really hungry.” “Who knows when we’ll get lunch? It’s a long flight. I’m Jed, by the way.” “No, thanks, maybe later.” The two men shake hands….
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July 2, 2004
100 YEARS AGO Sixteen people were wounded, seven of them critically — including one police officer — in a race riot that occurred between Italians and Irish on East 15th Street in New York City. The cause of the riot is thought to be old neighborhood grievances. Children started initial arguments, but soon their families…
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Imagination as a Group Effort
Among the recurring questions that I and other writers are often asked — along with, “How long did it take you to write the book?” and “Do you use a pencil or a pen?” — there is one that almost always comes up: “Is anyone else in your family a writer?” Those who ask this…
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My Favorite Demon
Writers are famous for their demons, whether they battle alcoholism, depression or the savage pain of a rotten youth. Isaac Bashevis Singer was no exception, except that his demons were demons. Unlike many writers, he made no secret of them: “I am possessed by my demons,” he declared to Commentary. Later, he made a telling…
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