From 7 P.M. to 7 A.M.
Gershom Scholem, From Berlin to Jerusalem: Memories of My Youth Schocken paperback, 1988 I first read this book eighteen years ago. So much time has passed since those Maryknoll days when I thought I wanted to…
Category: Jewish Tradition
Keeping Their Language Alive
Joseph Leftwich, Great Yiddish Writers of the Twentieth Century The writer wakens you, the reader, he rouses you out of your indifference, he shows you the things you had not seen before, he makes your…
Prevailing in This Epic Struggle: A Finkelstein Collage
Regarding [Israel’s] methodical breaking of Palestinian bones, Wiesel courageously chose silence: ‘I refuse to see myself in the role of judge over Israel. The role of the Jew is to bear witness; not pass judgment.’ …
Never Undemanding of Ourselves
John Garrard and Carol Garrard, The Bones of Berdichev: The Life and Fate of Vasily Grossman Wednesday 1 August 2012 Vasily Grossman represents an inspiring figure of engagement, and old fashioned Russian insistence on telling…
Endings/Continuings
The end of Yiddish, except as an academic pursuit or as a final nostalgia, is not at all Kafkaesque. Jewish history has many ironies and countless sorrows, as well as a panoply of cultural achievements…
An Anti-Defamation League unto Himself
I’ve read half of Philip Roth’s books, a few more than once. Recently I returned to the novel Operation Shylock and was struck by this testimonial outburst of one of the characters— “‘Grant me that…
Undeclinable
Emmanuel Levinas, Difficult Freedom Emmanuel Levinas, Ethics and Infinity: Conversations With Phillippe Nemo Emmanuel Levinas and Jill Robbins, Is It Righteous to Be? Interviews with Emmanuel Levinas A person dear to me is finishing her…
The Good News of Translation
1. Thanks to __________, I Was Able to Read_______’s _________ [Language] Richard Fein, Yankev Glatshteyn, Selected Poems [Yiddish] Hillel Halkin, Sholem Aleichem, Tevye the Dairyman [Yiddish] Nili Wachtel, Isaac Bashevis Singer, Meshugah [Yiddish] Martha…
Yiddish Writers
H. Leivick I have often felt that instead of writing my autobiography I would like to write the biography of my poems. I mean, tell the life story of some of my poems… Sholem Aleichem…
Poets/2
I Am by Laura Aranda I am on my way I am haven’t yet arrived and the in the in-between I am that bliss you find in a mountain rainstorm in a solitary blade of…