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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Why Do So Many South American Jews Write About Oppression?
The Chilean-born Jewish poet Marjorie Agosín has written “Always From Somewhere Else: A Memoir of My Chilean Jewish Father”; “Memory, Oblivion, and Jewish Culture in Latin America”; and “Taking Root: Narratives of Jewish Women in Latin America,” among other books. After fleeing the dictatorship of President Augusto Pinochet in Chile with her parents in the…
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I’m Not a Jewish Doctor But I Play One on ‘Chicago Med’
Fans of “Chicago Med,” which debuted last year, may have noticed a slight discrepancy in its casting. The major-city trauma center did not have a single Jewish doctor on staff. Jewish moms everywhere were aghast. But, for season two, problem solved. “I never thought I’d play an orthodox Jewish man,” said Ato Essandoh, who’s played…
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Why Reading Is a Lot Like Sailing
Travels in Translation: Sea Tales at the Source of Jewish Fiction By Ken Frieden Syracuse University Press, 389 pages $29.95 For centuries, Jews dreamed of elaborate sea voyages. After the destruction of the Second Temple, in 70 C.E., and the ensuing exile, wandering became the norm, as did trade involving long distances. Pilgrimages to Israel…
The Latest
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80 Years Ago, Jewish London Fought Off the Fascists on Cable Street
“They had a bloody cheek to come and demonstrate in a Jewish area, don’t you think so?” declares Hannah Grant. The 95-year-old great-grandmother is reminiscing about a moment in British Jewish history that took place exactly 80 years ago. But the outrage in her voice is undimmed by the decades. “The chutzpah of it —…
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Will Bob Dylan, Jaan Kaplinski or Philip Roth Win the Nobel Prize This Year?
Some book lovers see the annual circus around the Nobel Prize in literature as mostly Swedish political meshugas, often not primarily about quality of writing. Others retain optimism about the award’s potential for spreading news about worthy honorees such as Imre Kertész (2002); Joseph Brodsky (1987); Elias Canetti (1981), and Isaac Bashevis Singer (1978). The…
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The Unlikely Story of Nachman Libeskind’s Survival
In the Unlikeliest of Places: How Nachman Libeskind Survived the Nazis, Gulags and Soviet Communism By Annette Libeskind Berkovits, foreword by Daniel Libeskind Wilfrid Laurier University Press, 296 pages, $34.99 The name Libeskind most likely conjures Daniel Libeskind, architect of the Jewish Museum Berlin and master planner of the World Trade Center site. “In the…
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The 14 New Books You Should Be Reading This Fall
Cooler mornings; stray, amber-tinged leaves drifting romantically toward the sidewalk; a host of newspaper cartoons mocking an imminent flood of pumpkin-spiced baked goods and beverages — it must be fall! Call us biased, but we’ve always felt that the best way to celebrate autumn’s coziness is to curl up with a good book. Luckily, some…
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This Stunning Australian Story Rivals Philip Roth
The Golden Age By Joan London Europa Editions, 256 pages, $17 Where has Joan London been all my life? In Perth, Australia, apparently, at the outer edge of the earth, and completely off my radar. Which is a shame, because her third novel, “The Golden Age” — which takes its name from a pub-turned-convalescent home…
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Will Broadway Water Down Ben Hecht’s Venomous ‘Front Page’?
A Broadway revival of the joyously raucous, racy comedy “The Front Page”, about 1920s Chicago newspaper world high jinks, began previews September 20. Written by the American Jewish screenwriter and novelist Ben Hecht (1894–1964) and Charles MacArthur, both former Chicago crime reporters, the play’s gallows humor mocks Jews, African Americans, gay men and lesbians, and…
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A Year After His Death, Theodore Bikel Continues To Defy Typecasting
It’s been just a little over a year since Theodore Bikel died — he passed away a year ago July at age 91 — and as such, his legacy has yet to be cemented. This is undoubtedly due in part to the difficulty of encapsulating the legacy of a veritable Zelig – an Austrian-born Zionist…
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What Elie Wiesel Taught Me About Being a Writer
It was only a few weeks into my first semester of graduate school that things began to go awry. The M.A. Creative Writing workshop that autumn was led by a writer I admired; my fellow students were savvy and talented, energetic in their critiques of each other’s manuscripts. I’d just returned from a stint working…
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In Case You Missed It
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Yiddish רבנישע כּתבֿים ווײַזן אומגעריכטע פֿאַרבינדונגען צווישן ייִדיש און לאַדינאָRabbinical texts reveal surprising links between Yiddish and Ladino
לויט אַ נײַ בוך פֿאָרשונגען האָבן טראַדיציאָנאַליסטן אין ביידע עדות געהאַלטן, אַז ייִדן מוזן אָפּהיטן זייער גערעדט לשון
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Opinion Why Poland’s president canceled his menorah lighting — and how the West helped make that happen
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Fast Forward 4 House Democrats introduce bill that would enact progressive vision for fighting antisemitism
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Yiddish אַ ייִדיש־רעדנדיק קינד דאַרף אַ „שטעטל“׃ ווי עלטערן קומען זיי אַנטקעגןIt takes a village to raise a child in Yiddish: How parents are doing it
מחוץ די חסידישע קרײַזן האָבן געוויסע עלטערן געשאַפֿן זייערע אייגענע ייִדיש־סבֿיבֿות
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