Yiddish

Yesterday I wrote that my novel,  The Golem and the Jinni , is “pretty darn Jewish.” In truth, that’s only ...

Zi kholmt – she dreams.In Irena Klepfisz’s remarkable poem, “Etlekhe verter oyf mame-loshn / A few words in the mother tongue,” the speaker ...

The three of us waited expectantly and somewhat nervously in the seminar room, wondering why we had been summoned by ...

When I first began studying Yiddish, I felt like I was remembering something I already knew.It was a lovely sensation, this ...

The Workmen’s Circle—Arbeter Ring in Yiddish—is a Jewish fraternal organization devoted to progressive politics, the labor movement, and Yiddish language and culture.  In its ...

I’ve been told that students in my college courses sometimes have trouble following what I’m saying because I speak backwards. ...

I liked to sit sipping coffee in the tall kitchen window of my apartment in Vilnius. The window overlooked the ...

I had fun in Vilnius, despite my low tolerance for fun. Not to mention that fun in Vilnius seemed like ...

Before I could read and write in English, I spoke Yiddish. At age 3 I learned the Hebrew alef-bet alongside ...

I realized late in life that my parents weren’t your typical Baby Boomers. My dad wasn’t anti-establishment. My mother wasn’t a feminist. ...

I’ve thought a lot about Isaac Babel’s lovely characterization of the Jew as a man with “[s]pectacles on his nose and ...

One of the strange things about having your first book come out is that you think you’ve written one thing, ...