Meir Kahane: Jewish Radical
“Meir Kahane came of age amid the radical politics of the counterculture, becoming a militant voice of protest against Jewish liberalism. In the US he founded the Jewish Defense League in 1968 and then the ultranationalist KACH after his immigration to Israel in 1971, before his assassination in 1990. The incisive new biography from Dartmouth College […]
Bad Jews
“You can be called a ‘Bad Jew’—by the community or even yourself—if you don’t keep kosher, don’t send your children to Hebrew school, or enjoy Christmas music; if your partner isn’t Jewish, or you don’t call your mother enough. But today, amid rising antisemitism, what makes a Good or Bad Jew is a particularly fraught […]
Adam Gopnik: The Mystery of Mastery
Decades of writing bestselling books and award-winning essays has seen Adam Gopnik take on myriad topics. But recently a question obsessed him: how did the people he was writing about learn their outlandish skill, whether it was drawing a nude or baking a sourdough loaf? In The Real Work the long standing New Yorker writer apprentices […]
Jews & the Diamond Trade
From proposals and galas to James Bond and Uncut Gems, diamonds hold an indelible place in our culture. In A Brilliant Commodity: Diamonds and Jews in a Modern Setting historian Saskia Coenen Snyder shows how diamonds travelled from South African mines to processing factories in Amsterdam to the necks of high society women in New […]
2023 Keynote: Howard Jacobson
“With Jewish Book Week now into our eighth decade, Howard Jacobson, who has been speaking at the festival for almost half of our existence and predates us by just 10 years, delivers a specially created keynote: How the Jews Invented Disappointment. The Booker winner explains: “When asked to name what Jews were best at, I […]
György Pauk: 80 Years with the Violin
Internationally acclaimed violinist György Pauk is regarded as the foremost living torch-bearer of the Hungarian Violin School, which traces its origins to the 19th century violinist Josef Joachim, a close friend and collaborator of Mendelssohn, the Schumanns and Brahms. With musical accompaniment from violinist Eriko Nagayama, the longstanding Professor of Violin at the Royal Academy […]
Encounters: Judaism & Orthodox Christianity
How can finite minds approach an infinite and ultimately unknowable God? Is it true that Christianity is a religion of love and Judaism a religion of law? How much do Jews and Orthodox Christians have in common when they worship God? What can be done about Christian prayers that Jews find offensive? How much responsibility […]
Britain’s Jews
Jews have lived in Britain longer than any other minority – so ingrained into the national fabric that they are often not considered to be a minority at all. And while there is a pervading sense of anxiety, as periodic outbursts of antisemitism or flare ups in the Middle East turn the spotlight on them, […]
Muppets in Moscow
It’s time to play the music, it’s time to light the lights…or is it? After the collapse of the Soviet Union in the early 1990s, the timing seemed perfect to bring Sesame Street to millions of children across the former empire, with Jim Henson’s Muppet creations envisioned as ideal ambassadors for Western values, an idea championed […]
According To Her
A book-length interview with the Mother of God. No questions, just answers. Mariamne is an old Jewish peasant woman from Galilee, visited by a young Greek man who came to listen to her talk about her late son, Judas, John the Baptist and more. Maciej Hen’s novel According to Her was published to acclaim in […]
Shalom Auslander & Howard Jacobson
Mothers loom large in Jewish culture and literature in general. They feature in the titles – and contents – of the latest books by two of the most acclaimed authors around; Shalom Auslander’s novel Mother for Dinner and Howard Jacobson’s memoir Mother’s Boy. Now as the opening event of the 72nd annual Jewish Book Week, […]
Nazi Looted Art, A Time of Reckoning?
Speakers: Anne Webber, Lord Neuberger, Hannah Rothschild The discovery of a huge cache of Nazi-plundered paintings in a Munich flat brings hope that thousands of other looted artworks may be found. The revelation has focused worldwide attention on the German authorities and their and others’ moral and legal equivocations. Anne Webber, Co-Chair of the Commission […]