Pre-Shabbat Jewish Literary Links

Photo Credit: Reut Miryam Cohen
Photo Credit: Reut Miryam Cohen

Every Friday My Machberet presents an array of Jewish-interest links, primarily of the literary variety.

  • SO MUCH has been happening over at Fig Tree Books (my employer). Check out our latest newsletter.
  • I was delighted to receive the latest issue of Lilith magazine in the mail this week and especially impressed by Elizabeth Edelglass’s short story within it.
  • This week, Tablet magazine presented original fiction by Maxim Shrayer: “A Genius in the Attic: Secrets of a Cape Cod Dacha.”
  • Love this piece by Ruth Wisse, occasioned by the publication of a new biography of Saul Bellow. (ht Mosaic Magazine)
  • The Jewish Book Council is hiring a program assistant.
  • Shabbat shalom!

    Midweek Notes from a Practicing Writer

    How I Participated in a Poetry Reading from the Comfort of My Own Home

    Late Sunday afternoon, I returned from a lovely day’s event in southern New Jersey and noticed the following Tweet:

    I’d started following Poetry Super Highway on Twitter during this National Poetry Month. Their daily prompts are among those I’ve been seeing (thanks to C.A. LaRue). And, as mentioned last week, I’d submitted a poem for inclusion in Poetry Super Highway’s annual Holocaust Remembrance Issue.

    I didn’t plan to call in to the reading. But I RTd the announcement. And then I was encouraged to call in.

    So I did. (more…)

    My Niece’s Mitzvah Project

    If you want to be technical about it, Alexis isn’t my niece–she’s the daughter of one of my three first cousins. But she calls me “Auntie Erika,” and I love her to pieces. Which is why I’m so proud to share the project she has undertaken prior to being called to the Torah as a Bat Mitzvah.

    In her own words:

    Please sign up for my ProjectSave18 group. This is my Mitzvah Project and starting April 1, I will be posting facts about organ and tissue donation daily. I will be doing this throughout the entire month of April, Donate Life month. My grandma Alexis was in need of a heart and kidney transplant and partly because of this she passed away. Please help me spread the word by this cause by joining my group and sharing with all of your Facebook friends.

    (Interestingly—or maybe it’s not so interesting, since it IS Donate Life month—an item from MyJewishLearning.com crossed one of my social-media accounts a few days ago on the subject of “misgivings and misconceptions” re: organ donation.) (more…)