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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Books
Bernard-Henri Lévy’s Lady-Lacking Reading List
As I was perusing the New York Times book reviews this weekend (yes, the section whose cover features a review by Woody Allen), I happened upon an interview with French-Jewish writer and public intellectual Bernard-Henri Lévy. As someone with an above-average interest in French and Jewish (I’ve got a doctorate in just that topic, and…
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The Secret Jewish History of Strange Fruit
Editor’s Note: Rebecca Ferguson, an “X-Factor” winner, recently made headlines when she was invited to sing at Donald Trump’s inauguration. Ferguson responded by saying that she would perform if she could sing “Strange Fruit,” the haunting, classic song about lynching made famous by Billie Holiday. A few years back, we looked at the Jewish history…
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Meet the Businessman Introducing Kids in 12 Countries to Jewish Books — For Free
Harold Grinspoon is not a scholar, he is a businessman – a fact which he reminded me of multiple times throughout our conversation. Yet, despite his protestations, Grinspoon has done more than most in terms of cultivating the next generation of Jewish learners. He isn’t a lecturer, an author, a rabbi, or in any way…
The Latest
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Philosopher Martin Heidegger Spent Years Trying To Convince His Brother To Become A Nazi
Martin Heidegger, the much celebrated and much maligned German philosopher, is back in the news. As it turns out, his Naziism and anti-Semitism run far deeper than originally thought (we already knew it was bad, but it’s gotten worse). The Los Angeles Review of Books recently published a review (a translation of a piece that…
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How My Jewish Working Class Background Taught Me About Donald Trump
We live in a time of easy slogans and overly rigid categories. Since the election, countless pundits and friends have told me that I need to better understand white working class America. I’m now considered a member of the liberal media elite, or however you want to call someone who’s published a novel, earned a…
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Why We Need a Million Jew March
My fellow Jews! Our existence in America has never been in greater peril. Anti-Semitic clouds gather over the land like never before. Whether or not you are fervently Zionist, skeptically Zionist, Zi-curious, believe in a two-state solution, a seven-percent solution, a saline solution, anything but a final solution, really, you must protest the neo-Nazi menace!…
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That Famous Image of Carrie Fisher and Debbie Reynolds Has a Beautiful Backstory
By now, most of us have seen that phenomenal, heartbreaking photograph of a young Carrie Fisher watching her mother, Debbie Reynolds perform at the the Riviera Hotel in Las Vegas in 1963. In the photo Fisher, aged six, sits in the foreground on a stool backstage –- a tiny gray cherub directing our gaze towards the…
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‘Hester Street,’ Film Based on Abraham Cahan Novel, Set for Theatrical Adaptation
Forward founding editor Abraham Cahan’s 1896 novel about the immigrant experience, “Yekl,” is set for a new adaptation. The book was brought into the late 20th century by the 1975 film “Hester Street,” which made a star out of Carol Kane; now, playwright Sharyn Rothstein will adapt that film for the stage. As The New…
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The Plight of WWII Jewish Refugees in Shanghai, and More Forward Looking Back
100 Years Ago There was joy in the offices of the Hachnosas Orchim (Welcoming of Guests) organization on East Broadway in New York City this week. A group of about 200 immigrants from northeastern Poland and Lithuania had arrived, and their relatives were helping them enjoy the bounty of this land. Many of the immigrants…
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Books ‘Alt-Righter’ Milo Yiannopoulos Inks $250,000 Book Deal
Richard Spencer, inventor of the term “alt-right” is leading Nazi salutes. Cadillac is recruiting “neo-Nazis” for a commercial. And now provocateur Milo Yiannopoulos signing a book deal worth $250,000. Yiannopoulos identified himself early on with the “alt-right,” but more with the folks who disdain what they call “political correctness” than with the ones who use…
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How Debbie Reynolds Became Carrie Fisher’s Perfect Jewish Mother
The witty, multitalented performer Debbie Reynolds, who died on December 28 at age 84, just a day after her daughter Carrie Fisher, surprisingly found herself associated with Judaism both on screen and off. From celebrity notoriety as the decidedly non-Jewish spouse of Jewish singer Eddie Fisher, Reynolds survived her marriage’s breakup and went on to…
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Sports This year’s biggest World Cup upset came from its most ‘Jew-ish’ team
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News Who is Gadi Eisenkot, the Israeli politician who could dethrone Netanyahu?
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Opinion The latest victim of the culture war over Israel is a left-wing, lapsed Catholic Bible scholar
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Fast Forward Trump nominee defends college cartoon of Jewish student with devil horns at Senate hearing
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Fast Forward Chair of Britain’s largest arts center to step down amid antisemitism scrutiny
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Fast Forward Jewish anti-Zionist David Orkin defeats incumbent in NY Assembly primary
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Fast Forward Half of Americans think the U.S. is ‘too supportive’ of Israel