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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Barbra Streisand’s brand-new duet with Bob Dylan is a whole lot different than you might think
Though Dylan and Streisand's voices may seem ill-suited to each other, the two complement each other gorgeously on 'The Very Thought of You'
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What Was Passover Like Before WWII? 5 Facts You May Not Know
This article originally appeared in the Yiddish Forverts. If you‘re ever looking for descriptions of life in the shtetl, the most informative source is the work of B. Gorin (1868-1925). Though he was best known as the author of the first history of the Yiddish theater, Gorin was also a great writer with a special…
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What The Feminist Seder Meant To Me
Single until the age of 38, I’d had no shortage of getting together with women, but I was excited when I was invited to the New York Feminist Seder. This was the real deal, the one launched in the 70’s by Esther Broner, who with Naomi Nimrod had written “The Women’s Haggadah.” I was aware…
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Film & TV Why Steven Spielberg’s Promised Land Is Stuck In The 1980s
Steven Spielberg has said that he got into filmmaking mainly to defuse anti-semitism; to earn the respect and admiration that he couldn’t get as an isolated child. His quintessential success, “E.T.” (1982), is the story of his own childhood reconstructed, where the sensitive and cerebral daydreamer is vindicated by an otherworldly power. Anyone who says…
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Stormy Daniels Is The Quintessential Donald Trump Type — Not Jewish
Our president continually stirs up controversy, but one thing we can all agree on is that he’s faithful — not to one woman, but to a particular type. He requires a shapely body with ample breasts, topped by a face that almost demands to be photographed, and he seems disinterested in those who are Jewish….
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Remembering Bernie De Koven — Sage Of The Gospel Of Play
In 2017, a week before Passover, I heard the news that Bernie De Koven was dying of cancer. I wanted to do something, for Bernie, for myself, and for others who might take inspiration from his life journey. The interview that followed turned into the article below, published on December 20, 2017. Now, in 2018,…
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Indian Publishers Yank Children’s Book That Claimed Hitler Was A Great Leader
The publishers of an Indian children’s book that included Adolf Hitler on a list of “amazing leaders” have yanked the title from sale, following an outcry sparked by the Simon Wiesenthal Center, The Guardian reports. The book “Leaders,” which had been listed on its publisher’s website under the title “Great Leaders,” was published in 2016…
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Books 8 Modern Literary Texts To Read At Your Passover Seder
Every Passover, I find that my contributions to the Seder are somewhat limited. My niece and nephew have now been charged with the task of asking the four questions and my mother’s food preparations are almost sacred unto themselves. This year, though, I’ve been tasked with the delightful job of considering literary readings that are…
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Slaves In Egypt, Refugees In America: An Exodus Story In 8 Chapters
Amanda Morales hasn’t gone outside today. She didn’t go out yesterday or the day before, either. She is standing inside the Holyrood Episcopal Church in Manhattan’s Washington Heights, gazing out a window and waiting for her two eldest children to come home from school. Outside it’s cold and overcast, and the view isn’t much for…
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Julius Rosenwald Didn’t Repair The World — But He Tried Harder Than Most
JULIUS ROSENWALD: REPAIRING THE WORLD By Hasia R. Diner Yale University Press. 237 pp. $25. In a speech to the Associated Jewish Charities of Chicago, of which he served as president beginning in 1908, Julius Rosenwald outlined the life he might have led. As part-owner and leader of Sears, Roebuck & Co., Rosenwald pointed out,…
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It’s Not Cambridge Analytica We Need To Worry About, It’s Our Minds
The Cambridge Analytica furor, like the uproar over Russian penetration of Facebook that preceded it, has painted a bullseye on Mark Zuckerberg. I get why he and other social media CEOs are waffling about testifying at congressional hearings: They’re afraid that pictures of their oath-taking will remind people of the tobacco company executives in the…
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Robert S. Rubin, Who Spearheaded The Brooklyn Museum’s Battle Against Rudy Giuliani, Dies at 86
Robert S. Rubin, a philanthropist and investment banker, has died at 86. As chairman of the board of the Brooklyn Museum, Rubin defended the institution from censorship after then-mayor Rudy Giuliani took offense at one of its planned exhibits. His son Nathaniel told The New York Times’s Sam Roberts that the cause of Rubin’s death…
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