Pre-Shabbat Jewish Literary Links

Photo Credit: Reut Miryam Cohen
Photo Credit: Reut Miryam Cohen
Every Friday morning My Machberet presents an assortment of Jewish-interest links, primarily of the literary variety.

  • Not for the first time, I’m pointing you to an extraordinary piece by Kevin Haworth. This time: “On Never Having Read Anne Frank”.
  • From Mosaic magazine: the inimitable Ruth Wisse writes about Nora Gold’s Fields of Exile: “I am grateful for a work of fiction that honestly animates what is all too actual and true.”
  • New award for fiction on Jewish themes: the Amy Levy Prize.
  • On the Well Versed blog: the latest about Granta Israel.
  • And another milestone for Fig Tree Books!
  • Shabbat shalom.

    Pre-Shabbat Jewish Literary Links

    Photo Credit: Reut Miryam Cohen
    Photo Credit: Reut Miryam Cohen
    Every Friday morning My Machberet presents an assortment of Jewish-interest links, primarily of the literary variety.

  • A bit about the latest Nobel Prize winner for literature: Patrick Modiano.
  • And a bit about a project I’m involved with over at Fig Tree Books (I have to tell you–the response has been overwhelming!)
  • Adam Kirsch on new “Holocaust novels” by Howard Jacobson and Martin Amis.
  • A hearty Mazal Tov to the latest winners of the Moment Magazine/Karma Foundation Short Fiction Contest.
  • And another award-winning writer–a young one–gives “a shout-out to Betty Friedan.”
  • Shabbat shalom.

    Jewish Literary Links for Shabbat

    Photo Credit: Reut Miryam Cohen
    Every Friday morning My Machberet presents an assortment of Jewish-interest links, primarily of the literary variety.

  • In “Love Me, Love My Book,” The Jewish Week‘s Editor/Publisher, Gary Rosenblatt, reports on his experience as participant and observer in the latest Jewish Book Council “Meet the Author” event.
  • A hearty mazal tov to the winners of the latest Anna Davidson Rosenberg Poetry Awards (including my former poetry teacher, Matthew Lippman). Bonus: We can read the winning poems online.
  • A contemporary opera I don’t think I’ll be going to see.
  • In time for Father’s Day: Tablet and Marjorie Ingall present “The 13 Worst Jewish Fathers in Literature.”
  • And over on The Whole Megillah, you’ll find an interview with Michelle Caplan, Editor-in-Chief of Fig Tree Books. (You’ve seen FTB mentioned here on My Machberet before, but as a reminder, it’s “a new literary publishing house founded by Fredric Price, a successful entrepreneur in the orphan drug industry who wants to publish high quality fiction about the American Jewish experience (AJE).”)
  • Shabbat shalom.

    Words of the Week: Daniel Handler on I.B. Singer

    Isaac Bashevis Singer
    Isaac Bashevis Singer

    “Though Singer was an American writer, with a couple of National Book Awards to prove it, that doesn’t feel like the right nationality to put down on the Nobel list. Nor does Polish, which matches his birthplace. Jew is the word we’re looking for here. He’s not the first Jew to win the Nobel Prize in Literature, but he’s the first one to win it for writing in Yiddish, and we’re not going to see another one.”

    Source: Daniel Handler, “What the Swedes Read,” a recurring column in The Believer. The column on Singer appeared in the May 2014 issue, which I had the delight of thumbing through over the weekend.

    Jewish Literary Links for Shabbat

    Photo Credit: Reut Miryam Cohen
    Every Friday morning My Machberet presents an assortment of Jewish-interest links, primarily of the literary variety.

  • Mazel tov to the latest winners of Canadian Jewish Book Awards, who will be honored later this month.
  • A poem for Yom HaZikaron.
  • And a poem of mine.
  • New resource: YIVO Digital Archive on Jewish Life in Poland.
  • Finally, as Mother’s Day approaches here in the U.S., I recommend that you spend a few minutes watching filmmaker Judith Helfand’s “Love and Stuff” on NYTimes.com. (It would have moved me to tears even if I hadn’t known the family and attended Florence Helfand’s funeral myself.)
  • Shabbat shalom.