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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Let the world’s greatest expert on haggadot help you choose your haggadah this year
For 14 years now, I’ve reviewed haggadahs for this publication. Often, I find they illuminate developments in the Jewish world, such as growing independence, creativity, fragmentation, and reassessment of ritual and liturgical forms. This year’s crop, though, showed me something about myself. Probably the most significant Haggadah published this year is Marcia Falk’s “Night of…
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Just when you thought you were ready for Passover, a kosher poultry shortage could fowl everything up
This Passover, observant Jews may not just be forgoing leavened bread; they might also have to skip chicken. Jewish supermarkets, butchers, and restaurants are facing a nationwide kosher poultry shortage which means this year’s matzo balls might lack that heavenly schmaltz. Park East Kosher on Manhattan’s Upper East Side is coaxing some shoppers to roast…
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Leonard Cohen changed Israel during the Yom Kippur War. Did it change him?
In October of 1973, Israel was fighting the Yom Kippur War with Egypt and Syria and Leonard Cohen decided to visit. His exact reasons have long been a mystery. Hearing him clarify them, you may wish they’d stayed that way. In an unpublished manuscript, the 39-year-old poet wrote he “wanted to go fight and die…
The Latest
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Books A thriller from Mexico and a debut detective novel: The Jewish books you need to know this month
Welcome to your monthly tour of the Jewish literary landscape! I have four new titles to share and a special announcement — we just launched our Bookshop storefront, where you can shop the books recommended in this newsletter. I’ll be keeping the page updated with titles I’m loving, Forward Book Club picks, and other fun…
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Embracing Trump’s politics, David Mamet has become the Kanye West of American letters
The author of 'Recessional' offers up a bevy of conspiracy theories
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How the war already changed the meaning of one artist’s childhood — and her painting
'When they started bombing Kyiv, there was no place left for fantasy,' painter Zoya Cherkassky-Nnadi said
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Mother to George Costanza, wife of Mr. Potato Head, Estelle Harris had a comic style all her own
Estelle Harris (born Nussbaum) who died April 2 at age 93, proved that sources of laughter in American Jewish television sitcoms are incisive self-awareness and time-honored tribulations. Harris was paired with two of the loudest, most obstreperous Jewish comedians of the modern era, Jerry Stiller in TV’s “Seinfeld” and Don Rickles in Disney’s “Toy Story”…
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Art How painting the Torah brought the director of ‘The Chosen’ closer to Judaism
On my iPad, I’ve been drawing a visual response to this week’s Torah portion and the Midrash about it. I do this every week and, over the last few years, I’ve made five sets of these drawings. The first set started on a whim. I had learned some odd stories about the first parsha Beresheit….
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A paragon of erudition and a vital poet, he captured the American gay Jewish experience
The American Jewish poet and translator Richard Howard, who died March 31 at age 92, proved that in a literary career, timing is of paramount importance. To be born less than two weeks before the 1929 stock market crash to an impoverished Jewish family in Cleveland might have seemed unlucky. Yet Howard was promptly adopted…
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April 26: The Forward at 125: A conversation with the four living Editors in Chief of our storied publication
This discussion will take place on Wednesday, April 26 at 7 p.m. ET./ 4 p.m. PT. The editors of the English Forward from 1990 to today, together for the first time, will talk about our history, present, and future. What would the Forward’s founder, Ab Cahan, make of today’s digital report, and of American Jewry?…
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How the Jewish calendar got coded — and how ingenious coders made it happen
Humanity is currently engaged in a massive, civilization-sized project to digitize all knowledge. You may have heard about this. The project is huge, but it’s not unified; contained within it are thousands of smaller projects, each devoted to digitization in a specific field. Some of these fields have developed slowly, while others have zoomed ahead….
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