George Whitman and the Magic of Shakespeare and Co.

By Tamara Shayne Kagel
Published on December 19, 2011

The Story of the Storyteller

By Dikla Kadosh
Published on July 12, 2011

“West Wing” creator Aaron Sorkin on his agent Ari Emanuel

By Danielle Berrin
Published on November 14, 2008

Quarterly calendar

Published on March 15, 2007

Quarterly calendar.

Home and Jerusalem

By Rob Eshman
Published on March 15, 2007

The two greatest Jewish inventions of the 20th century are, to my mind at least, Hollywood and Israel. Jews founded Hollywood to help the world escape reality; they founded Israel to help Jews escape the world.

Israeli entry ‘Mud’ wins at Sundance

Published on February 1, 2007

The art of keeping a travel journal

By Rolf Potts
Published on November 30, 2006

I was going through some old boxes the other day when I found a beat up old notebook that contained a journal of my trip to the Philippines almost nine years ago.My travel journals haven't been quite so detailed in the years since I returned from the Philippines -- mainly due to the professional demands of travel writing, which takes up most of my note-taking time on the road.Nevertheless, I believe that keeping a travel journal can be one of the most rewarding habits a person can keep on the road.

Jewish Book Month’s Table of Contents

Published on November 2, 2006

Jewish Book Month's Table of Contents

Sex at the Skirball

By Hank Rosenfeld
Published on April 13, 2006

When sexy authors like Erica Jong and Jerry Stahl get together onstage, you expect fireworks. But when I drag my friend Kay up to Skirball for the Writers Bloc conversation, the room is too bright, and Kay tells me Jong's blue-framed eyeglasses and gold necklace make her come off more Carol Channing than "sex goddess."

7 Days in The Arts

By Keren Engelberg
Published on November 17, 2005

7 Days in the Arts

A New Blend of Chick-Lit Sleuth

By Susan Josephs
Published on April 21, 2005

Like her protagonist Sophie Katz, Kyra Davis has skin the color of a "well-brewed latte." That's why she has spent a large portion of her life fielding comments about her ethnicity.

There was her supervisor at a clothing store, for example, who asked about her Star of David necklace, since how could Davis be Jewish when she looks black? Or all the times people have assumed she's Puerto Rican and lecture her on taking pride in one's heritage when they discover she can't speak Spanish.

"Occasionally, when people ask me where I'm from, I'll make up some country in Africa and act really offended if they say they never heard of it," Davis said.

The Many Lives of Lev Nussimbaum

By Sandee Brawarsky
Published on April 7, 2005

Lev Nussimbaum lived as though life were theater, inventing an identity, dressing the part, shifting scenes, seeking audiences everywhere. He thought he could keep rewriting the ending, believed he could talk his way out of anything including his Jewish past, but ultimately he could not.

7 Days In Arts

Published on August 12, 2004

Chug on down to the Getty today or tomorrow, as they present Sharon Katz and the Peace Train as part of their Garden Concerts for Kids series.

Second Government

By Tom Teicholz
Published on July 15, 2004

I've been thinking a lot recently about French philosopher, journalist and filmmaker Bernard-Henri Levy (only in France can philosopher hyphenate with filmmaker).

We had lunch about six months ago. At the time, Levy's English-language edition of "Who Killed Daniel Pearl?"(Melville House), had just been published. The book had received a mixed response for its controversial thesis that Daniel Pearl was murdered because he was on the trail of a larger story, of connections between Pakistani security forces, Pakistan's nuclear establishment and Al Qaeda.

‘L-Words’ in a J World

By David Finnigan
Published on March 25, 2004

Joan Nestle is one of many Jewish lesbian writers with work catalogued at ONE, an archive similar to New York's Lesbian Herstory Archive, which Nestle co-founded in 1973.

Kids Page

Published on June 19, 2003

You know that harmless-looking body part inside your mouth? The tongue? It sure looks nice enough, but it gets a lot of Israelites into trouble in this week's parsha.

Knockin’ on Heaven’s Door

By Sandee Brawarsky
Published on March 6, 2003

"Welcome to Heavenly Heights" by Risa Miller (St. Martin's Press, $23.95).


Many writers have imagined the Jewish immigrant experience, setting their novels and short stories on the Lower East Side and places like that, where newcomers can forge their way to become Americans. Risa Miller's debut novel, "Welcome to Heavenly Heights," is a different version of that story, with American Jews making new homes in Israel, reversing the exile. This transition can be more pressure cooker than melting pot, mixing idealism, religion, bureaucracy, family complexities, shifting expectations, love and, never far away, violence.

Funny ‘Guys’

By Naomi Pfefferman
Published on August 29, 2002

In between schmoozing with kids for his acclaimed Fairfax High documentary "Senior Year" in 1998, filmmaker David Zeiger hung out with the funny old guys who did lunch with his dad on Tuesdays at the Mulholland Tennis Club.

A Trivial Pursuit

By Teresa Strasser
Published on February 7, 2002

You don't plan to become a trivia writer, it just happens. The next thing you know, you're a one-woman trivia carnival, packing up your trunk of battered almanacs and dictionaries and moving on to the next show.

The Yom Kippur War

By Rob Eshman
Published on September 20, 2001

According to the Hebrew calendar, this Yom Kippur marks the 28th anniversary of the Yom Kippur War. It's an unrounded number, the kind of date that might otherwise go unnoticed if it weren't for the fact that America has just entered its own version of that war.

Deaths in the Family

By Rob Eshman
Published on August 9, 2001

Whenever one of our writers or contributors -- or I myself -- use the term "Jewish community," I think of Lew Wasserman. An interviewer once asked the former MCA chairman and power broker about the Jewish community here. Wasserman shot back: "I don't know of a Jewish community. It is nonexistent."

7 Days In Arts

By Solange Borna
Published on August 9, 2001

Middle-aged, mild-mannered Barney Cashman craves excitement in the form of an extramarital affair. Neil Simon's "Last of the Red Hot Lovers" follows this bumbling protagonist as he attempts to seduce three women, including his wife's best friend, in his mother's apartment.

‘Strange Fruit’ and Stalinism

By David Evanier
Published on August 24, 2000

Southern trees bear a strange fruit,
Blood on the leaves and blood at the root,
Black body swinging in the Southern breeze,
Strange fruit hanging from the poplar trees.
David Margolick, writer of books and articles on legal issues for The New York Times and Vanity Fair, has hit a raw nerve with his haunting book, "Strange Fruit: Billie Holiday, Cafe Society, and an Early Cry for Civil Rights" (Running Press). The book is an account of the scalding impact of one song - a song about a lynching - on scores of Ameri-can activists, writers, musicians, artists and intellectuals.

Of One Mind

By Naomi Pfefferman
Published on July 6, 2000

"Blood Simple" put the brothers on the map (Ethan quit his job as a statistical typist at Macy's), and the Coens went on to write, produce and direct a series of off-center, ironic, unsettling fables peopled with vividly drawn cartoon characters.

Adrift in a World in Which God is Hidden

By Rick Richman
Published on October 14, 1999

It is remarkable how many great Jewish American writers first came to the public's attention through a volume of short stories.