Benjamin Ivry is a frequent Forward contributor.
Benjamin Ivry
By Benjamin Ivry
-
Culture Documenting the Life of Documentary Filmmaker Albert Maysles
The American Jewish filmmaker Albert Maysles, who died on March 6 at age 88, received the National Medal of Arts in 2014 for his celebrated documentaries on the Beatles; the Rolling Stones; and the reclusive relatives of Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis in “Grey Gardens.” Yet arguably, the most enduring inspiration for Maysles’s artistry was from Yiddishkeit….
-
Culture How the Golem Got His Groove Back
This year marks the centenary of the book publication of Gustav Meyrink’s serialized novel “Der Golem.” Until a 2006 episode of TV’s “The Simpsons,” where Bart Simpson stole a golem from Krusty the Clown, Meyrink’s was probably the most famous adaptation of the ancient Jewish legend in which a man of clay is brought to…
-
Culture Irving Kahn, Oldest Money Manager, Dies at 109
Irving Kahn, the American Jewish money manager who died on Thursday, February 26, at age the age of 109, was more than just the oldest living investment professional, as he was often dubbed. Kahn exemplified a work ethic which stressed ever-fresh intellectual interests as a way to remain young in spirit. Always on the lookout…
-
Culture How Marvin Miller Led Players Union and Changed Baseball Forever
Marvin Miller, Baseball Revolutionary By Robert F. Burk University of Illinois Press, 352 pages, $35 This stately, well-researched study raises the question of which is more enduring, anti-Semitic hatred or the loathing — even after death — felt by plutocrats forced against their will to treat their workers fairly. Robert F. Burk, an emeritus professor…
-
The Schmooze Lesley Gore’s Defiant Jewish Voice Stilled
Lesley Gore, the singer best known for ‘It’s My Party,’ has died after a battle with lung cancer. Benjamin Ivry took a look back in 2010 at her very Jewish career. From her earliest hits, like 1964’s defiant “You Don’t Own Me,” Gore was at once independent, self-assured, and linguistically gifted, as evidenced by her…
-
Culture Philip Levine Was Working-Class Poet Inspired by Yiddishkeit
Philip Levine, the Jewish poet who died on February 14 at age 87, was a feisty writer inspired by working class roots and a family tradition of bubbe-meises (grandmother’s fables). In “Jewish American Poetry: Poems, Commentary, and Reflections” (2000) Levine analysed his poem “The Old Testament”: “My twin brother swears that at age thirteen I’d…
-
Culture Was Helmut Schmidt ‘Contaminated by Nazi Ideology’
● Helmut Schmidt and the Crap War: the Biography from 1918 to 1945 By Sabine Pamperrien Piper Verlag, 352 pages, $25.36 Born in 1918, Helmut Schmidt, who served as chancellor of West Germany from 1974 to 1982, has been enjoying cultural prestige in his old age, in part for having recorded works by Bach and…
-
Culture Remembering Chicago Critic and Arts Maven Andrew Patner
Andrew Patner, the Chicago arts maven who died at age 55 on February 3, looked to Jewish elders for inspiration about what culture can signify. His “I. F. Stone: A Portrait” (1988) featured a sustained interview with the radical journalist born Isidor Feinstein in Philadelphia, ranging from current politics to ancient Greek civilization. Patner was…
Most Popular
- 1
Culture Why saying ‘L’shana Tova’ on Rosh Hashanah may not be the correct phrase
- 2
Fast Forward Was the viral Ta-Nehisi Coates interview a hit piece or fair play? A journalism ethics expert weighs in.
- 3
Culture How my odious cousin Roy Cohn was responsible for creating Donald Trump — and me
- 4
Opinion This is the most disorienting Rosh Hashanah in memory
In Case You Missed It
-
Forverts in English Workers Circle now offers Yiddish courses that meet twice a week
-
Fast Forward Democratic poll shows 71% of Jewish voters across 7 swing states favor Kamala Harris
-
Fast Forward As Florida braces for Hurricane Milton, this rabbi is defying an evacuation order so he can help
-
Yiddish ווי האָבן ייִדן געהיט די ייִדיש־קולטור אױף יענער זײַט „אײַזערנעם פֿאָרהאַנג“?How did Jews maintain their Yiddish culture behind the Iron Curtain?
ייִדישע ליטעראַטן, װאָס האָבן געטרײַ געדינט די קאָמוניסטישע רעזשימען, האָבן גענוצט זײערע פּריװילעגיעס כּדי אָפּצוהיטן ייִדיש.
-
Shop the Forward Store
100% of profits support our journalism