Benjamin Ivry is a frequent Forward contributor.
Benjamin Ivry
By Benjamin Ivry
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Culture In search of the lost time of a gay Jewish novelist
In a new book, Saul Friedländer shows how an analytical approach that made him an acclaimed Holocaust historian, can explicate a gay writer of Jewish origin. “Proustian Uncertainties,” concerns the French novelist Marcel Proust, whose “In Search of Lost Time” offers emotionally complex narration and memories linked to sexuality and Judaism. Perhaps surprisingly, this subject…
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Culture On its 50th anniversary, the secret Jewish history of ‘Doonesbury’
Celebrating its 50th anniversary on October 26, the comic strip “Doonesbury” must hold a longevity record for what was originally intended as an undergraduate jape. And it has a surprising amount of Jewish influence. Created by Garry Trudeau, “Doonesbury” early on peppered a wide range of targets with wry comments, as the Harvard Bulletin”commented in…
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Culture Devoted to his friends and Israel, sometimes to a fault — Zubin Mehta at 84
Zubin Mehta’s retirement last autumn after a half-century as musical director of the Israel Philharmonic Orchestra (IPO) was followed by many tributes, including massive CD box sets of his complete Warner recordings, his complete recordings for Decca with the Los Angeles Philharmonic, and complete Columbia albums. Now 84, Mehta has earned a retrospective look at…
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Culture Meet the last surviving Jewish member of ‘The Chicago 7’
At 81, Lee Weiner, the last surviving Jewish defendant among the Chicago Seven, published a memoir, “Conspiracy To Riot” before the October 16 release of the Netflix film “Trial of the Chicago 7” written and directed by Aaron Sorkin and starring Sacha Baron Cohen. Over a half-century ago, Weiner, a Chicago native, was charged with…
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Culture Elizabeth Taylor was the original Jewish Cleopatra
Editor’s Note: Gal Gadot will not be the first Jewish Cleopatra. While news of the Israeli actress’ casting in a new version of the Egyptian queen’s story caused on online kerfuffle, there is a high quality precedent for a member of the tribe donning the Ptolemaic monarch’s beaded headdress. Elizabeth Taylor, whose conversion to Judaism…
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Culture Remembering Murray Schisgal — the consummate Jewish playwright with the eyes of a basset hound
The American Jewish playwright Murray Schisgal, who has died at age 93, baffled generations of actors and theatregoers with his bittersweet plays redolent with Yiddishkeit. Author of such acclaimed works as “The Typists and The Tiger (1963),” “Luv (1964),” and “Tootsie” (1982), Schisgal mystified even astute actors who specialized in performing his works but were…
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Culture Helen Reddy — She was a Jewish woman; hear her roar
The Australian singer Helen Reddy, who died on September 29 at age 78, is best remembered for the 1972 feminist anthem “I Am Woman,” a hit with surprising Jewish resonance. According to the “The Billboard Book of Number One Hits” Reddy was looking for positive songs about women to record, but decided that these did…
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Culture Remembering RBG as a lover of opera and diva of human rights
Ruth Bader Ginsburg’s nickname “The Notorious R.B.G.” was a humorous allusion to The Notorious B.I.G., the stage name of the rapper Biggie Smalls (born Christopher Wallace). Yet as her admirers know, Ginsburg, who died on September 18 at age 87, was more attached to classical music, especially opera. Born in Brooklyn, her first such experience…
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Fast Forward Rep. Ritchie Torres, outspoken pro-Israel advocate, is dropping hints that he could run for NY governor
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Fast Forward Ursula Haverbeck, infamous German Holocaust denier known as ‘Nazi grandma,’ dies at 96
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