Launches, Readings, and More: Jewish Lit Online

Even with iCal, I can barely keep track of the many online literary happenings that are taking place these days. Here’s just a sampling of events taking place over the next several days that I’d love to catch.

Everything listed here is free and, to my knowledge, open to the public; I’m not sure which ones may be recorded and posted later. NB: I’ll cite times according to NYC/Eastern time zones.

Tuesday, May 12 (3:00 p.m.): The Leo Baeck Institute (LBI) Book Club launches with a discussion of My Blue Piano, an anthology of poems by Else Lasker-Schüler (1869-1945), translated by Brooks Haxton, “including a major essay by the translator on the life and times of the author. The poems collected in this bilingual volume represent the full range of Lasker-Schüler’s work, from her earliest poems until her death.”

Tuesday, May 12 (7:00 p.m.): YIVO hosts a discussion of David Slucki’s Sing This at My Funeral: A Memoir of Fathers and Sons. Slucki will be in conversation with Eddy Portnoy. (Over on Goodreads, you’ll find a few brief thoughts of my own about this book.)

Wednesday, May 13 (10:00 a.m.): The Jerusalem Writers Festival (which began on Sunday) presents “Writing Mad Men: Matthew Weiner in Conversation with Ron Leshem.”

Wednesday, May 13 (7:00 p.m.): Scholars Victoria Aarons, Susan Erbst, Stuart Miller, and Aimee Pozorski will offer a virtual discussion of The Plot Against America (both the novel and the HBO series). Avi Patt will moderate. Co-sponsored by multiple organizations.

Advertisement for event about The Plot Against America that is described/linked above.
Advertisement for event about The Plot Against America that is described/linked above.

Wednesday, May 13 (8:00 p.m.): Lilith magazine celebrates its latest (Spring 2020) issue with a virtual launch party: “The evening will include a provocative Q&A with Peggy Orenstein, author of Boys & Sex, with a special Yiddish musical send-off by Eleanor Reissa.”

Wednesday, May 13 (8:30 p.m.): Another launch party! This time, for Julia Kolchinsky Dasbach’s Don’t Touch the Bones, which won the 2019 Idaho Prize for Poetry.

Sunday, May 17 (12:00 p.m.): Hosted by Jerusalism, “an initiative to support English language literary culture in Israel,” the first (of six) Mekuvan readings will feature poet Erika Meitner. “The session will include a reading by Erika, as well as moderated discussion and an open Q&A.”

Sunday, May 17 (7:00 p.m.): Hosted by the Yiddish Book Center, Ilan Stavans will present a reading of his play “Kaddish for My Father; or, Why We Lie,” followed by a brief Q&A. “As a famous Mexican theater and telenovela actor lies in his deathbed, his son tried to come to terms with the emotional trail he left behind and with the tension between the public figure and private man. Directed by Daniel Lombardo.”

And please mark your calendars for this end-of-month event:

Information about the Literary Modiin event mentioned and linked below.
Information about the Literary Modiin event mentioned and linked below.

Sunday, May 31 (1:00 p.m.): Literary Modin’s first virtual author event, featuring Ellen Meeropol, Sandell Morse, and yours truly!

a laptop computer (switched on), an open notebook, and other items assembled on a tabletop.