This article originally appeared in the Yiddish Forverts. Continuing my irregular series on non-Jewish American celebrities who spoke Yiddish I would be loath not to mention one of Hollywood’s most charismatic film stars of all time, James Cagney. Cagney, best known for his portrayals of tough guys in gangster films, crime dramas and war epics,…
This article originally appeared in the Yiddish Forverts. When reading about the lives of secular 19th- and 20th-century Yiddish and Hebrew writers, you will undoubtedly learn that many of them had studied in yeshivas before adopting a secular lifestyle. Chaim Grade, for example, was a student in the Navoraduk Yeshiva, which taught its students a…
Learn how to make authentic blintzes for Shavuot, using old-fashioned farmer cheese and topping it with homemade apple sauce.
This article originally appeared in the Yiddish Forverts. Israel, together with the entire European continent, loses its collective mind every May when Eurovision rolls around. The internationally televised singing contest, which passes by nearly unnoticed in the U.S., is a big deal in the Jewish state. Every performance in the run-up to the garish spectacle…
This article originally appeared in the Yiddish Forverts. The Russian city of Smolensk is located in a region that has historically been contested between Russia and Lithuania, which later became part of Poland. Smolensk became part of Russia following the Russian-Polish wars in the 17th century, but its Lithuanian roots left a clear imprint on…
This article originally appeared in the Yiddish Forverts. The first Holocaust memorial services took place while the genocide of Europe’s Jews was still occurring. Whenever a city or town was liberated, a few Jews would return, clean up the mass graves where their relatives had been shot, erect a simple marker and chant “El Malei…
This article originally appeared in the Yiddish Forverts. Jeffrey Gottlieb is getting fifteen minutes of fame for the second time in his life. The co-founder of the “Polish-Jewish Dialogue Committee,” Gottlieb has spoken with Jewish organizations and news outlets this week to explain why his group bestowed its “Jan Karski Humanitarian Award” on Ewa Kurek,…
This article originally appeared in the Yiddish Forverts. I’m sitting here listening to the recorded voice of my Uncle Yoyne z”l as he leads the Passover seder in 1962… and I’m kvelling. Yoyne Gottesman was a secular Jew, or as we used to say in those days, a veltlekher yid. He didn’t keep kosher or…
This article originally appeared in the Yiddish Forverts. Cracow was an unlikely tourist stop for William Mehrvarz. Most Iranian millennials want to “See Iran First,” and their vacation itineraries often include the Lotfollah Mosque in Isfahan or the Valley of Stars on the island of Qeshm. Mehrvarz opted for Cracow in August 2016 to investigate…
This article originally appeared in the Yiddish Forverts. Few people today know that in the 1950s, Yiddish programming on Israeli radio had half a million listeners every evening. Even Jews from abroad would listen, including those behind the Iron Curtain, where Jews would seek out ways to listen to the banned transmissions on their transistor…
This article only appears in the Yiddish Forverts.
100% of profits support our journalism
