Talya Zax is the Forward’s opinion editor. Contact her at [email protected] or on Twitter, @TalyaZax.
Talya ZaxOpinion Editor
By Talya Zax
-
Culture ‘Mozart in the Jungle,’ An Italian Jewish Celebration, and 5 Other Things to Watch, Read, and Do This Weekend
Hanukkah is coming, which means, for many, some serious winter nesting. Before you huddle up for the holiday, partake in some of the last best moments of Jewish culture in 2016. 1) Binge on theater, new and old This week and next herald the openings of Tony Award-winning playwright Richard Greenberg’s new play “The Babylon…
-
Culture Rachel Kushner Wrote About Jerusalem Refugee Camp For NYT Mag — Here’s What Happened Behind the Scenes
Last week, novelist Rachel Kushner published an essay called “We Are Orphans Here: Life and death in East Jerusalem’s Palestinian refugee camp,” recounting her time in the Shuafat Refugee Camp, in The New York Times Magazine. The essay details Kushner’s experience in Shuafat with a local Palestinian community organizer named Baha Nababta as her guide….
-
Culture At Launch of Forward Anthology, A Celebration of Yiddish Fiction
Should you have happened, the evening of December 5th, to be taking a stroll on Manhattan’s 16th street, allowing yourself a romantic sigh over the Christmas trees winking in the windows, you would likely not have guessed you were especially close to a gathering of giddy Yiddishists. And yet you were; the Center for Jewish…
-
Culture Writers of ‘Vagina Monologues,’ ‘The Vibrator Play’ to Feature in D.C. Theater’s American History Cycle
Last week, Washington D.C.’s Arena Stage announced a significant new initiative: over the next decade, the theater will commission 25 plays by 25 writers, one for each decade of American history. Playwrights who have already signed on to the project include Eve Ensler, Sarah Ruhl and Aaron Posner. Fittingly, given that the theater is located…
-
Culture Bob Dylan Will Have Acceptance Speech at Nobel Prize Ceremony — He Just Won’t Be Reading it
In the latest installment of the Bob Dylan Nobel Prize Saga — which, we would note, gets less interesting as it gets more unnecessarily complex — the Nobel Foundation has announced Dylan is sending a speech to be read at the December 10 presentation of the Nobel Prizes in Stockholm. Like all Nobel laureates, Dylan…
-
The Schmooze LISTEN: Regina Spektor’s Hamilton Mixtape Track is Absolutely Dreamy
We were thrilled to report Regina Spektor would be putting her own spin on the “Hamilton” song “Dear Theodosia” for “The Hamilton Mixtape,” and we’re even more excited now we’ve heard the final version. Listen to her honey-toned version, featuring Ben Folds, below.
-
The Schmooze Are We Actually Celebrating Woody Allen’s 81st Birthday?
The always-nebbishy, sometimes brilliant, frequently self-involved, occasionally trite Woody Allen turns 81 today. Not all will be celebrating; his son Ronan Farrow, for instance, who spoke out this year on the media’s failure to adequately examine Allen’s alleged sexual abuse of his daughter Dylan, is unlikely to be raising a glass. For those who are…
-
Culture Susan Faludi’s ‘In The Darkroom’ Named To NYT 10 Best Books Of 2016
Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Susan Faludi’s “In The Darkroom,” a memoir about her father — who, after 25 years of estrangement, contacted her in 2004 to inform her of his sex reassignment surgery — has been named one of the New York Times’s 10 Best Books of the 2016. Explaining the selection, the editors of The…
Most Popular
- 1
News Your complete guide to Trump’s Jewish advisers and pro-Israel cabinet
- 2
Fast Forward Trump AG nominee Matt Gaetz has left a trail of antisemitic comments
- 3
Opinion Trump’s first picks are die-hard Israel supporters, mocking the pro-Palestinian protest vote
- 4
News What a Secretary of State Marco Rubio would mean for American Jews and Israel
In Case You Missed It
-
Fast Forward Progressive Jewish groups back Senate resolutions against arms sales to Israel
-
Fast Forward Sotheby’s to auction a Ten Commandments tablet with a disclaimer: Israel always wanted it to be put on public display
-
Antisemitism Notebook Shadowy GOP firm is behind pressure campaign on Schumer over antisemitism bill
-
Yiddish ווידעאָ: דער ליובאַוויטשער רבי מוטיקט פֿרויען צו לערנען תּורהVIDEO: The Lubavitcher Rebbe encourages women to learn Torah
די דרשה איז אויך לינגוויסטיש אינטערעסאַנט: כאָטש דער רבי רעדט ליטוויש ייִדיש, זאָגט ער אַרויס „פֿרוי“ ווי „פֿרו“.
-
Shop the Forward Store
100% of profits support our journalism