Notes from Around the Web: Literary Links for Shabbat
Shabbat shalom!
Posts Tagged‘Resources for Jewish writers’
As Promised: Handout for “Beyond Bagels & Lox: Jewish-American Fiction in the 21st Century”
Last night I returned from an exhilarating several days in Washington, where I attended the annual conference of the Association of Writers and Writing Programs (AWP) and visited the National Museum of American Jewish Military History for a reading from Quiet Americans. I have so much to share with you about this trip, but for the moment, I want to focus on last Thursday’s conference panel: “Beyond Bagels & Lox: Jewish-American Fiction in the 21st Century,” which was listed in the conference program as follows:
Beyond Bagels and Lox: Jewish-American Fiction in the 21st Century. (Erika Dreifus, Andrew Furman, Kevin Haworth, Margot Singer, Anna Solomon) Jewish-American fiction has long been seen as a literature of emigration from the shtetl, assimilationist angst, and overprotective parents. But what’s nu? How do Americans born decades after the Holocaust and the birth of the State of Israel deal with those complex subjects in fiction? Who are the new Jewish immigrant characters? How does American Jewry’s more than 350-year history inspire plot/setting? And how are writers today influenced by Judaism’s rich multilingual and spiritual legacy?
We were assigned a fairly large meeting room, and we were delighted to see that the room was packed. In fact, we ran out of the handouts we’d brought with us, so I promised to post the handout online. Please click here for the PDF. As noted on the handout, our reading list is utterly incomplete–as would be any single-page, double-sided document of this sort. But we think that the handout can be useful nonetheless.
A round of thanks to my amazing co-panelists, and to our interested and engaged audience.
Jewish Ideas Daily Seeks Editorial Assistant
“Full-time editorial assistant needed for Jewish Ideas Daily (www.jewishideasdaily.com), a growing website of thought, culture, politics, and religion. We are looking for someone organized and responsible, deeply and critically engaged with Jewish matters. Editorial experience and computer/tech skills are highly desirable. Competitive compensation commensurate with experience; must be based in New York. ” For the full announcement, check JewishJobs.com.
New Jewish Children’s Book Writing Contest
In response to numerous comments from gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgender parents and allies about the lack Jewish children’s books that include GLBT families or characters, we are launching the Keshet Jewish Children’s Book Writing Contest.
Keshet is seeking manuscripts of 800 – 1000 words for a fictional Jewish children’s picture book with a GLBT family or characters. We’d like the story to be of interest not just to GLBT families but to the larger Jewish community, so the storyline needs to be engaging, funny, or surprising in some way, not didactic. The story should have a clear, clever and interesting narrative plot with universal themes and Jewish content. We’re not looking for a story about what it’s like to live in a gay Jewish family, but rather a book with one or more members of a GLBT Jewish family as the central character(s) in a great story. We welcome stories that show ethnic diversity as well as diversity of family structure.
The manuscripts will be evaluated by a committee of parents, educators, children’s librarians, and a children’s book publisher. The author of the winning manuscript will receive a prize of $250 and the possibility of having their book published.
There is no entry fee, and the deadline is April 15, 2011. For more information, please visit Keshetonline.org. (via @femministas)
From The Forward: The Triangle Fire Poetry Contest
A century ago, 146 workers – mostly immigrant women – died as flames engulfed the floors where they worked at the Triangle Shirtwaist Company factory in New York City. The ensuing public outcry against unsafe work conditions was covered in detail in the pages of the Jewish Daily Forward by poet Morris Rosenfeld.
Rosenfeld’s portrayal of the brutal effects of employee exploitation led to a trial of the factory’s owners, a greater push to unionize the garment trade and the establishment of new labor laws designed to protect workers.
But did these events eradicate sweatshops?
Lead to equality of opportunity for women?
Change attitudes toward immigrants?
End exploitation of the poor?The Forward is accepting original, unpublished English and Yiddish poems that address these questions or reflect upon the tragic fire’s meaning and legacy. A distinguished panel of judges will select a winning poem in each language to receive a $500 cash prize and to be published in the Forward.
There is a $15 entry fee for this contest (with the puzzling exception in the cases of entrants “who are legal residents of Colorado, Maryland, North Dakoa, and Vermont”). Submission deadline is 5 p.m. EST on February 14, 2011. More information and the complete rules can be found at The Forward’s contest website.