Minsk
What Became of Europe’s Nazi-Looted Libraries?
While the Nazis’ plunder of visual art has garnered attention, the Third Reich’s attempt to dominate Europe’s literary culture is little known.
Back in the Old Courtyard
Between 1929 and 1935, Yiddish writer Moyshe Kulbak (1896-1937) published a comic novel called “The Zelmenyaners” serially in the Minsk-based Yiddish language monthly Shtern.The novel told the story of a family courtyard in Minsk, in Soviet Belorussia, which was being progressively transformed through aggressive Soviet modernization.
Being a Jewish Musician in Belarus
Image by Ivan Dribas. Courtesy of Minsker Kapelye.
Singing Yiddish Songs in Belarus
On the Yiddish Song of the Week blog, Dmitri Slepovitch writes about “Ikh vel nit ganvenen” (“I Will Not Steal”), a song he recorded in his native Belarus: