Members of the Scribe
A Book and Its Translators
It was a freezing afternoon outside Warsaw in March 2012, and I was sitting in a cramped hut listening to ...
Jewish History and Jewish Memory
On the first day of “The History of the Jews in Eastern Europe,” my college professor explained the tension between ...
My Favorite Episodes in Helena Rubinstein’s Biography
It’s difficult to choose only one—she led such an amazing life! The first that springs to mind, though, is the ...
My Favorite Wandering Jews
I grew up assuming that the Wandering Jew was a Jewish creation, our metaphor for the Diaspora. When I began ...
On Trailing the Life of Helena Rubinstein
Helena Rubinstein wrote—or rather commissioned—two autobiographies that merely serve to perpetuate her legend, and therefore cannot really be trusted… But ...
On Writing a Biography of Helena Rubinstein
People always ask me the same question: “What made you want to write about Helena Rubinstein?” And the answer is always ...
Crypto-Jews and Autobiographical Animals
Maxim D. Shrayer: Papa, I want to ask you about varieties of crypto-Jews—those who conceal their Judaism in order to preserve ...
My Name is Yusha
Any run-in with a Russian bathhouse is bound to shock: men chugging bottles of beer-like kvass, felt hats helping them ...
A Jewish-Russian Writer as New Englander
Maxim D. Shrayer: Papa, let’s continue with our topic. What happens after a Jewish writer emigrates from the USSR to the ...
A Fictional Model of the Former USSR
Maxim D. Shrayer: Papa, let’s start with a basic question. What are the stories gathered in Dinner with Stalin about?David Shrayer-Petrov: Above ...
Novels and the Art of the Mauritshuis
Last night, I had the great honor of reading from my new novel, The Anatomy Lesson (Nan A. Talese/Doubleday) inside ...
Asher Lev as a Model for Rembrandt
After reading the penultimate draft of my latest novel, The Anatomy Lesson (Nan A. Talese/Doubleday), a trusted reader and one ...
On Being Jewish in Amsterdam
Recently, a journalist who was interviewing me asked me to describe what it felt like to be a Jewish New ...
A Legacy of Fear
I was biking recently in the foothills of the San Jacinto mountains in southern California, and I found myself far ...