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
-
The Gift Nadine Gordimer Gave to Me
There is one quality that is perhaps more important to a writer than any other. Nadine Gordimer, who died this week in South Africa at the age of ninety, not only possessed it in abundance but was able to grant a measure of it to others, as she did to me when I was struggling…
-
Books Now You Can Call Ishmael, To Talk About Books
“Call me Ishmael,” declares one of the most famous opening sentences in Western literature. But what if the narrator of Herman Melville’s “Moby Dick” was actually asking you to call him? That was the whimsical thought Logan Smalley offered in a spirited bar conversation about notable first sentences. He jotted the notion down on a…
-
Star of the Show That Inspired ‘Homeland’ Discusses How TV Affected Reality in Israel
“Prisoners of War,” the Israeli TV drama that inspired “Homeland,” will be released on DVD in the United States on July 8 — and the timing couldn’t be better. “POW” concerns three Israeli soldiers who finally get to return to their families after 17 years in captivity, only to discover that life in the public…
The Latest
-
The Women Rabbis Of New Mexico
When I tell East Coast Jews that I’m from New Mexico, the first question out of their mouths is invariably, “Are there Jews in New Mexico?” Once I’ve quashed the temptation to shoot back, “What do YOU think?” I go on to explain. Yes, there are Jews in New Mexico. Yes, there is a synagogue…
-
6 Things About Jewish New Mexico
Fancy some green chili in your matzo brei on Passover? Then you should go to New Mexico. Here are six things about Jewish New Mexico you should know. 1) New Mexico is home to many of the last crypto-Jews, who claim that their ancestors fled to Mexico during the Spanish Inquisition to escape persecution. Over…
-
Indie Rock With A Spiritual Core
The Antlers are a Brooklyn-based indie rock band best known for their intense 2009 opus “Hospice,” a concept album about a terminally ill child in a cancer ward. However, to label the group as “sad rock” would be to underestimate their talent. Prior to “Hospice,” The Antlers was singer Peter Silberman’s solo project. He released…
-
The Jewish Life and Times of Nadine Gordimer
The South African Jewish author Nadine Gordimer, who died on Sunday, July 13, at age 90, expressed an even-handed humanism throughout her literary career. This is far from the case for every winner of the Nobel Prize for Literature, which Gordimer was accorded in 1991. Her scrupulous sense of fairness, which motivated her to oppose…
-
Music The Secret Jewish History of Prince
Prince died at the age of 57 on April 21, 2016. In honor of what would have been his 60th birthday, we’re re-reading this very Jewish appreciation. In 1993, at the height of his fame, after selling millions of albums, collecting a closetful of Grammy, Golden Globe and Academy awards, and establishing himself as one…
-
The Origins of Yiddish: Part Tsvey
In last week’s column dealing with two recent articles about the origins of Eastern European Yiddish, I dwelled more on the first — Cherie Woodworth’s account of the “standard theory” most systematically worked out by the great Yiddish linguist Max Weinreich (1894–1969) and of some of its problematic aspects that have led to the adoption…
-
Why Jewish Artists Continue To Be Inspired by The Bible
Art historian Samantha Baskind, author of, among others, “Raphael Soyer and the Search for Modern Jewish Art” and the Encyclopedia of Jewish American Artists, now tackles thorny problems of identity and representation in her latest book. “Jewish Artists and the Bible in Twentieth-Century America” asks why several modern American Jewish artists were inspired by biblical…
-
Holocaust Survivors’ Stories as Cartoons
There’s a painting of Hitler with an almost Picasso-esquely skewed face, and a blue coat. There’s a painting of a boy in a brown suit peering at a swastika painted on a wall. And then there are paintings of houses, people taking walks, forests and trees, lots of trees. In other words, the paintings of…
Explore
Most Popular
- 1
Opinion In the rush to vilify Israel, genocide scholars ignored the truth
- 2
Fast Forward Coldplay welcomed Israeli fans onstage ‘as equal humans.’ Why are some Jewish people mad?
- 3
Fast Forward Trump lawyer who praised ‘Mein Kampf’ is now accusing Harvard of antisemitism, report says
- 4
Fast Forward The fraudster at the center of an NBA scandal once proclaimed ‘tzedek tzedek tirdof’
In Case You Missed It
-
Opinion Israel’s strike in Qatar: An audacious bid for victory, or just another foolhardy provocation?
-
Fast Forward University of Oregon cuts spare Judaic studies faculty who had raised alarm
-
Fast Forward As more Jews acquire guns, a Jewish security group urges stronger regulations for synagogues
-
Yiddish די ייִדישע גאַסנשילד פֿונעם פּאַריזער „פּלעצל“ איז צוגעגנבֿעט געוואָרןYiddish street sign for the Pletzel, the Yiddish quarter of Paris, is stolen
דער אינצידענט איז פֿאָרגעקומען בעת אַ ממשותדיקן וווּקס פֿון אַנטיסעמיטיזם אין פֿראַנקרײַך
-
Shop the Forward Store
100% of profits support our journalism
