Jewish Literary Links for Shabbat

  • As an academically trained historian of modern France, I subscribe to an active listserv on French history. This week, the listserv presented a review of The Hidden Children of France, 1940-45: Stories of Survival, edited by Danielle Bailly and translated by Betty Becker-Theye.
  • Barbara Krasner (The Whole Megillah) recently returned from Prague, where she visited the graves of Franz Kafka and Arnost Lustig.
  • I neglected to create a dedicated post on the 15th to announce the latest monthly Jewish Book Carnival. But it’s a good one, so please go over to the August host, the HUC-JIR librarians’ blog, and take a look.
  • Tablet profiles the impressive founder of Yaldah magazine.
  • Commentary magazine has launched a literary blog: Literary Commentary. According to the magazine’s editor, John Podhoretz, the blog “will be a place to discuss matters fictional, science-fictional, Jewish-fictional, and all other manner of story, and it will be the charge of D.G. Myers, long a professor of English literature at Texas A&M and now a member of the faculty of the Melton Center for Jewish Studies at Ohio State University.”
  • The Adventures of Augie March, by Saul Bellow, is Chicago’s latest “One Book, One Chicago” pick.
  • I purchased two novels for my Kindle this week: The Submission, by Amy Waldman (whom Eric Herschthal has just profiled for The Jewish Week), and, at long last, Sarah’s Key, by Tatiana de Rosnay, which I hope to read before going to see the movie (my parents saw it last week, and they are still talking about it).
  • Shabbat shalom!

    Jewish Literary Links for Shabbat

  • I love this piece by Erica Lyons. May it be a call to action for programs and those who run them–including programs for Jewish journalism–to recognize the potential contributions of those of us Jews who–horrors!–have passed our fortieth birthdays.
  • How did one collection of Jewish-focused fiction get its title? Read all about it.
  • What I’m reading right now: an advance copy of The Little Bride, by Anna Solomon.
  • Ken Schoen, proprietor of Schoen Books, chronicles a return to his family’s homeland.
  • Thirty-five years after Entebbe, Yonatan Netanyahu is remembered as a Harvard student. Which makes this Harvard alum especially moved, proud, and astonished that she wasn’t aware of this particular history.
  • Shabbat shalom!

    Jewish Literary Links for Shabbat

  • Through November 30: “The Jewish Writer: Portraits by Jill Krementz.” Exhibition at the Center for Jewish History in NYC.
  • Next week (also in NYC): The Greatest Yiddish Literature Party Ever.
  • Professor Gil Troy, on the new genre of  “Zionist captivity narratives.” (via JTA)
  • Mazel tov to the newest winners of the Simon Rockower Awards for Excellence in Jewish Journalism.
  • I dare you to watch this prize-winning, (very) short film without being moved.
  • Shabbat shalom!

    Notes from Around the Web: Literary Links for Shabbat

  • I always enjoy Josh Lambert’s New Books column for Tablet, but I found this week’s edition, in which Josh introduces various texts that deal with “Jewish life–and Jewish ghosts–in China, Europe, and Latin America,” particularly intriguing.
  • New blog alert: On kabbalahworlds, writer Kitty Hoffman is “on the trail of Isaac the Blind, SagiNaHar, father of kabbalah, possible ancestor. Tracking his teachings through Occitania, Catalonia, Castile, Andalucia; finding traces of long-gone Jewish civilisations. What remains?”
  • From The Forward’s Sisterhood blog: “Bridges, A Jewish Feminist Journal, Says Goodbye.”
  • Last week, Haaretz published another Writers Edition. Among the participants: Leon Wieseltier, Mario Vargas Llosa, Ron Leshem, Eshkol Nevo. and Nathan Englander.
  • The latest issue of JewishFiction.net has gone live, and it features some amazing authors.
  • Shabbat shalom!

    Notes from Around the Web: Literary Links for Shabbat

  • Thanks for the Center for Jewish History for posting a video of its May 18 “Evening with Philip Roth.”
  • On Wednesday, the Jewish Book Council’s Twitter Book Club convened to discuss David Bezmozgis’s novel, The Free World. Here’s the transcript.
  • Meantime, the JBC has announced the title for its next Twitter Book Club: Deborah Lipstadt’s The Eichmann Trial.
  • I was deeply saddened to read of the death of Zev Birger, a man described by The New York Times as “an official in the young state of Israel who later revived and then led the Jerusalem International Book Fair, turning it into a major event on the literary calendar,” from injuries he sustained when struck by a motorcycle. Mr. Birger, 85, was a Holocaust survivor.
  • David Kaufmann introduces us to Robert Pinsky’s Selected Poems.
  • The Forward presents its new website.
  • Hoping to spend some quality time this weekend with all of the wonderful links in this month’s Jewish Book Carnival.
  • Shabbat shalom!