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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Q & A: Leonard Bernstein’s Children Reflect On His Legacy
In honor of the centennial of Leonard Bernstein’s birth — he was born August 25, 1918 — cities across the globe are conducting two years of celebratory events. Bernstein’s children, Alex, Jamie and Nina Bernstein, spoke with the Forward about the centennial, and their father’s legacy. The conversation has been edited for clarity and brevity….
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In Two Films, Opposite Sides Of The Holocaust’s Intergenerational Trauma
In the opening shots of Chantal Akerman’s 1980 film “Dis Moi” (or “Tell Me”), the director shows herself unhurriedly traversing the streets of Paris. Set against these disarmingly low-key images, we hear a conversation between the director and her mother, Natalia, or Nelly, who lost her own mother – Chantal’s grandmother – in the Holocaust….
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Why Do Vienna’s Street Signs Honor So Many Anti-Semites?
The name of Vienna’s former mayor Karl Lueger was finally expunged from a section of the city’s main boulevard, the Ringstrasse, in July 2012. Lueger was a modernizer who, at the end of the 19th century, established Vienna’s streetcar system and brought the city’s gas and electricity networks into public ownership. He was also a…
The Latest
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Chosen To Laugh — Dan Friedman In Conversation With Adam Rovner At Denver University
Dan Friedman, former Ali G writer, executive editor of the Forward, supreme dictating editor of the Backward and comedy analyst will be appearing in conversation with Professor Adam Rovner of Denver University on Thursday February 22. To find out how to become a friend of the Forward and get notices of events like these, email…
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See ‘The Band’s Visit’ After Exclusive Talkback With Author Itamar Moses
A group of Forward donors will see the new Broadway show that everyone is talking about. On February 25, we’ll have a delicious lunch, executive editor Dan Friedman will lead an exclusive discussion with the play’s author Itamar Moses and then we’ll all go to see “The Band’s Visit” — the best new musical of…
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World War II-Era Envelopes Suggest Polish Knowledge of Holocaust
As Poland’s Senate passed what The New York Times editorial page called “a needless, foolish and insulting draft bill that would penalize any suggestion of complicity by the Polish state or the Polish nation in the Nazi death machine,” the National Library of Israel announced that it had received an astonishing donation that proved just…
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Books How A Yiddish Program In Paris Is Invigorating Research In Israel And The U.S.
This article originally appeared in the Yiddish Forverts. A unique Yiddish immersion program in Paris has begun its second semester. Its students, graduate students and postgraduates, praise it wholeheartedly. At the new Paris Yiddish Center’s program for intermediate and advanced students, each participant receives 15 hours of instruction in language and literature each week. They…
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In Mozambique, A (Very) Small Jewish Community Thrives
Mozambique is a great place to be Jewish, says Sam Levy, one of the lay leaders of the small Jewish community in Maputo, the Southern African country’s capital city. “There’s no anti-Semitism here. The religious leadership actively cultivates tolerance and understanding.” Although the Jewish community’s core membership numbers around 35, it is still a part…
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This UFO Changes Everything
We at the Forward are delighted to welcome Marty Kaplan to his first column for the Forward. An award-winning columnist for Huffpo and the Los Angeles Jewish Journal, Marty will be writing his “Oh Kaplan, My Kaplan” column for us twice a month. His eagle-eyed view from the West Coast promises to be eye-opening, heart-rending…
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Film & TV How A Boy And His Great-Grandfather Bonded Over A Holocaust Story
Elliott Saiontz’s bedroom is crammed with collections. His walls are covered with stickers of football teams and players. There are also dozens of karate trophies, pottery projects and framed autographs of athletes, political figures, even the members of his favorite band, Train. There are a lot of autographs too. But in a corner of the…
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Film & TV Why The Spielberg-Kushner ‘West Side Story’ Might Turn Out Okay
Few American musicals have won more sustained audience devotion than “West Side Story,” the 1957 brainchild of an all-Jewish creative team. Playwright Arthur Laurents, choreographer Jerome Robbins, composer Leonard Bernstein, and lyricist Stephen Sondheim, collaborated, despite sustained tensions, to produce a musical that has been staged around the world for six decades and inspired an…
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