Новости за 21.03.2017

Mazel tov to Gal Gadot, the Israeli actress and star of the upcoming film Wonder Woman, who gave birth to her second child, a daughter named Maya, this week. We at Tablet, with our contractual obligation to breathlessly cover the gestational periods of every Jewish (or even Jew-ish) movie star, are extremely happy for her, and I’m sure that even two days post-partum, she looks better in an evening gown than anyone else on the planet. (Her pregnant appearance at the Golden Globes in a slinky cut-out black gown put us all to shame... Читать дальше...

Robert Silvers, a founding editor of The New York Review of Books, died Monday at age 87. Silvers, along with Barbara Epstein (who died in 2006), founded the influential literary journal in 1963, and served as its editor until his death—for more than half a century. The New York Review has been widely lauded as one of the foremost English-language literary and intellectual periodicals. Its very first issue, which the New Yorker called  “surely the best first issue of any magazine ever,” featured pieces by Norman Mailer... Читать дальше...

The prevailing philosophy in the world today, one that’s probably valid, is to refuse to give any further oxygen to the noxious beliefs of the alt-right. The Internet, after all, gave them the platform that has allowed them and their toxic swill to ascend to the halls of power, or at least, of influence, and only the Internet can take it away; therefore, we should all collectively stop following them on Twitter, publishing a million outraged hot takes on their latest provocations, and generally ignore them back into oblivion. Читать дальше...

In a little town in 18th-century Eastern Europe, there was a Jewish rabbi who eked out a living mostly as a melamed for little children. Life was difficult; in fact, in one month — Adar, 1743 — both his father and his son died. In addition to teaching, the rabbi tried to supplement his income by writing his own books of theology, biblical exegesis, law, and history. Even though the printing press had existed for almost 300 years, the potential audience for his works was so small that it did not make financial sense to print them; instead... Читать дальше...

Literary critic Adam Kirsch is reading a page of Talmud a day, along with Jews around the world.

Last week, Jewish food lovers from across the globe came together for Nosh Berlin—a weeklong festival of films, cooking demonstrations, talks, and pop-up dinners focused around Jewish cuisine. If Berlin doesn’t register as an obvious place to hold a bacchanal of blintzes, it should. Over the last decade—thanks in large part to the tens of thousands of Israelis (and to a smaller extent Jewish Americans) who have settled in Berlin—the city is blossoming into a hub of creative Jewish cuisine.

The beginning of the story is a familiar one: Jewish kids want some festive lights just like their neighbors and ask their parents why they can’t also light up their yard during the holiday season.