Archive for category Jewish Books

Jewish Delis: The History of the Nosh

Posted by Rachel Feltman in Jewish Books on June 22, 2010

Have you ever wondered how Delis became such a huge aspect of Jewish American culture? Today, I got the opportunity to flip through Sheryll Bellman’s America’s Great Delis: Recipes and Traditions from Coast to Coast. Bellman explains that the first delis were opened by German immigrants in New York. With buildings hard to come by, most cooks sold their wares in pushcarts. In the early 1900’s, a Jewish population in the city increased so rapidly that they were the largest immigrant group there by 1910. Naturally, Ashkenazim food began to dominate the pushcarts of New York. Soon the Deli business moved inside, and by then traditional European Jewish foods had become synonymous with Delicatessen.

While reading, besides finding out that I might be hot dog royalty (Charles Feltman, a German immigrant, opened the first American hot dog stand 1867), I also learned all about the origins of some of America’s favorite deli foods. Here are some fun facts:

  • Bagels originated in Krakow, Poland circa 1610. They were called beygls, and were originally given as gifts to women after childbirth.
  • Cheesecake was served to Olympic athletes in Greece as early as 776 B.C.E.
  • Most jarred pickles you can find at the grocery store are pickled rapidly using heat instead of long soaks in brine. To get the texture and taste of a genuine pickle, make sure you go to a deli that makes their own. My personal favorite, the half sour dill pickle, is pickled for two weeks. A real full sour takes three months.
  • Seltzer, adopted quickly as a classic deli drink because it complimented the rich food, was once known as Jewish champagne.
  • If they’re made of milk, chocolate syrup, and seltzer, why are they called Egg Creams? Some think it was a witty way of describing the beverage as being rich, since when it was invented (1890) no one could possibly afford to use eggs and cream in a beverage.
  • Jewish macaroons were probably adapted from a recipe created by Italian nuns, while biscotti were most likely inspired by Mandelbrot that Spanish Jews brought to Italy. It’s a small world!

For more facts and a ton of great recipes, check out the book at Bellman’s website: http://sheryllbellman.com

Of course, anyone can see that there just aren’t as many Delis as there used to be, especially outside of New York! Find out how to fight the fast food takeover at http://www.savethedeli.com.

It doesn’t matter where you’re from: Nothing beats an old-fashioned Jewish Deli. Yum!

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Summer Reading Roundup

Posted by admin in Jewish Books, Link Roundup, Publishing on June 11, 2010

School may be out for summer, but don’t underestimate the fun of curling up in the warm weather with a good book. We’ve rounded up the best of the web to get you excited about summer reading!

1.     Joanne Meier blogs about the benefits of reading during the summer on Reading Rockets’ Sound It Out blog. According to a new study, simply giving kids books may actually be as effective as summer school. Summer reading also helps kids retain what they’ve learned throughout the school year.

2.     Many book stores are offering incentives to kids for reading. This summer, with through Barnes & Noble’s Passport to Summer Reading program, when kids read 8 books, they can earn a free book of their choice. The program also offers downloadable activity kits for parents and educators. At Borders, kids under 12 can earn a free book when they read 10 books through their ‘10 Summer Double Dog Dare reading program.

3.     Know of any good books? Now you can share your summer reading recommendations or search for the perfect title on Twitter by using the hashtag #sumread10.

4.     Participate in a summer reading program! Visit http://www.cslpreads.org for a list of reading resources (for children and adults) and find out if your local library is part of the Collaborative Summer Library Program.

5.     E-readers are great for tossing into your beach bag, but if you’re thinking about buying one, check out this article from The New York Times to find out which one best suits you.

If you know of any other great reading programs or summer reading recommendations you would like to share with other readers, let us know in the comment section. Happy reading!

-Jill Finkelstein

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Happy 122nd Birthday, JPS!

Posted by admin in Jewish Books, JPS Books, JPS History, Publishing on June 4, 2010

June 3, 1888, was “a great day in Philadelphia Judaism,” when 100 of the leading Jewish intellectuals in America met in Philadelphia to found the Jewish Publication Society. Fast forward 122 years and JPS is still going strong!

The amazing thing about working for the Jewish Publication Society is learning about how much historical significance the organization has within American Jewish history. In response to a large wave of Jewish immigration in the United States, the society was founded to educate the American-born children of Jewish immigrants about their heritage and unite American Jews. Still to this day, JPS’s mission is to provide literary content to those interested in many aspects of Jewish life.

Every day when I enter the office, I walk past a bookshelf filled with JPS books dating back to the late 1800s and I’m always awestruck. I feel honored to work for an organization that has had important Jewish figures like Henrietta Szold and Chaim Potok serve as Editor-in-Chief and has published works from noted scholars and literary greats like Isaac Bashevis Singer, S.Y. Agnon, Yehuda Amichai, Saul Bellow, Martin Buber, Hillel Halkin, and Abraham Joshuah Heschel. Despite all these great factors, the Jewish Publication Society would never have been as successful throughout the years without the help of you, our readers. Thank you for your continued support of JPS and here’s to many more years of providing new and exciting Jewish content.

-Jill Finkelstein

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Celebrating A Belated Women’s History Month

Posted by admin in Jewish Books, Jewish Knowledge on April 12, 2010

Sarah, our New Linkages intern, guest blogs today about Jewish Women.

Szold's writing desk Jewish Museum of Maryland

Each month there is a different reason to celebrate. In March, Jewish women everywhere were commemorating Women’s History Month. Even though March is over, it is still a time to reflect on the literary and cultural achievements of Jewish women. Henrietta Szold is a monumental figure in the world of Jewish literature and learning. In 1893, she became the first paid employee and secretary of JPS. In that capacity Szold wrote, edited, translated, and oversaw the publication of 87 books. Many of these works continue to pervade contemporary American Jewish culture.

The many voices of Jewish women are constantly being read and heard in new and innovative ways. Below are some exciting resources to both learn and share in the stories of Jewish women.

The Jewish Women’s Archive (JWA) is an online resource providing a repository of information about influential North American Jewish women, web-based exhibits, documentary films and educational tools. JWA’s blog, “Jewesses with Attitude”, is a space where women can discuss feminism, Jewish-related events and more.

Lilith Magazine is an independent, Jewish women’s publication, featuring current event articles, historical and contemporary first-person accounts, art, photography, fiction and poetry all by and about Jewish women.

From the Rib?, Jewess and The Sisterhood Blog are all forums dedicated to discussing issues Jewish women face day-to-day.  Topics range from posts about the changing role of women in Orthodoxy to women in healthcare reform to personal anecdotes about Jewish experiences.

While online resources are helpful and educational, Jewish women are writing their own narratives, guides and stories about Jewish life.  Below are some recent and exciting books written by and about Jewish women:

Sisters at Sinai: New Tales of Biblical Women by Rabbi Jill Hammer Ph.D

In this anthology of 24 stories, Rabbi Jill Hammer explores the influence women of the Bible have had on Jewish life and Torah. Drawing on the importance of midrash, Hammer creates new, imagined biblical worlds in which women such as Miriam, Sarah and Lilith are reexamined as teachers and leaders.

Genesis: The Beginning of Desire by Avivah Zornberg Ph.D

A National Book Award Winner, this uplifting exploration of Genesis breathes new life into biblical stories, weaving together midrashic and literary sources. Through her own lyrical style, Zornberg shares her beautiful, personal experience of God with her readers. Other notable works by this author include: Particulars of Rapture: Reflections on Exodus (2001) and of The Murmuring Deep: Reflections on the Biblical Unconscious (2009).

Inventing Jewish Ritual by Vanessa Ochs

In this provocative guide, Ochs explores the ways contemporary Judaism is evolving and engaging in new traditions such as naming ceremonies for baby girls, Rosh Hodesh groups, women’s seders and healing services.  This text is a guiding light in modern Jewish ritual and women’s place in that ritual.

The Red Tent by Anita Diamant

This fascinating and engaging first novel by Diamant re-creates the life of Dinah, daughter of Leah and Jacob. The story focuses on the “red tent,” the place where women of the tribe gathered during their menstrual cycles or pregnancies. Through this insider’s look at the daily lives of a biblical group of women, the feminine characters truly come to life.

Rashi’s Daughters Trilogy and Rashi’s Daughter, Secret Scholar by Maggie Anton

All these incredibly detailed and page-turning novels focus on the lives of medieval Jewish women in France. The text blends Talmudic study with a plot thickened by the relationships between the scholar Saloman ben Isaac, and his three daughters, Joheved, Miriam and Rachel.

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Teaching the Holocaust

Posted by admin in Jewish Books, Jewish Knowledge, JPS History on April 9, 2010

Prior to working for JPS, I taught Hebrew School throughout my 4 years in college. I switched grades a few times but stayed within the K-2nd age range. For me, one of the hardest topics to teach students that young was the Holocaust.

When I was younger, facts about the Holocaust were gradually exposed. I probably knew a little more than other kids because my parents told me when I was little that my grandmother was a survivor. She sailed to the US in 1940 from Wuppertal, Germany with her brothers and arrived just a couple weeks before her 6th birthday. I knew she had been adopted because her parents had to stay behind and never made it out. I can’t remember exactly what I learned at what age, but I remember certain books I read before I turned 10 such as A Picture Book of Anne Frank and Terrible Things (coincidently published by JPS), which both used age appropriate descriptions. While one book tells one recount of the Holocaust, the other teaches a lesson about standing up to discrimination. I took both approaches when teaching the Holocaust to my students. I revealed only as much as I thought was appropriate and turned the lesson into how we can deal with discrimination. I was always impressed by the advanced level of their responses. Some of my students knew a lot of specifics and would want to discuss them with the class, but I would have to cut them off and let them share their thoughts with me privately if I felt that the information was more than some of the other students to handle.

While we want to protect the innocence of our children, it’s not as easy as it used to be. Today, kids are exposed to a lot more information than I was as a kid now that the internet is so easily accessible.

In addition, more parents now want their children to be aware of their communities and global issues at a younger age. The situation begs the question: how do we teach our young students about the Holocaust and how much is too much? While this question has been asked so many times and schools have their own Holocaust curriculums, maybe the solution isn’t as rigid as it used to be. How can we as teachers and Jewish educators adapt to the changing trends?

-Jill Finkelstein

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There are many Holocaust Education Centers, museums, and teaching aids for educators, including this one: http://holocausteducationctr.org/ and the clearinghouse for all Holocaust organizations, the AHO: http://www.ahoinfo.org/
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The 59th Annual Jewish Book Awards

Posted by Carol in Jewish Books on March 11, 2010

My goodness, what a week: first, the Oscars on Sunday night, and then the Jewish Oscars on Tuesday! The Jewish book Oscars, that is: the 2009 National Jewish Book Awards.

Jewish Book Council

Dozens of Jewish literary notables were there: Joseph Telushkin, James Kugel, Lawrence Schiffman, Ari Goldman, Alana Newhouse, Yitz and Blu Greenberg, just for starters. Lots of other familiar faces, too, including two former JPS interns Naomi Firestone and Miri Pomerantz Dauber, now with the Jewish Book Council, which hosted the event.

It was quite a night for JPS, with more award winners than any other publisher: Editor Emerita Ellen Frankel and Avi Katz took a prize for the best Illustrated Children’s Book, for their JPS Illustrated Children’s Bible; Paul Steinberg and Janet Greenstein Potter’s Celebrating the Jewish Year: The Spring and Summer Holidays won for best Jewish Family Literature, Judy Klitsner’s Subversive Sequel in the Bible took the award for Scholarship. Frauke von Rohden’s Meneket Rivkah: A Manual of Wisdom and Piety for Jewish Women was a finalist for in the Scholarship category, and Frankel and Katz also were finalists in Jewish Family Literature. Below you can view a slideshow of our winners at the event!

I’m a big fiction fan, so I’ve added Joseph Kertes’ Gratitude: A Novel, the fiction award winner, to my (50+ book!) reading list. If you want to add winners to your reading list, check out wwww.jewishbookcouncil.org and add your comments and suggested book list titles below in response to this posting.

-Carol Hupping, Interim Director

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Purim Literary Roundup!

Posted by admin in Jewish Books, Jewish Knowledge, Link Roundup on February 26, 2010

It’s been awhile since we’ve brought you a literary roundup, so in honor of Purim we’re bringing you the best of the web devoted to this joyous holiday.

  1. The editors at Tablet Magazine have put together a handy guide about the holiday filled with FAQs and fun things to do to enhance your holiday.
  2. Looking for a new spin on the Hamentaschen? Ima on and off the Bima has posted some creative recipes. Also, good news for those with gluten allergies, she’s even included arecipe for gluten-free Hamentaschen!
  3. If you don’t feel like baking, but are looking for the best Hamentaschen out there, Jewcy has assembled a list of the 5 best Hamentaschen Bakers in America, including Lipkins in the native home of JPS, Philadelphia.
  4. Abby Wisse Schachter, associate editor of the New York Post, writes for Commentary Magazine about how feminism and progressive thinking have created a new meaning for the holiday.
  5. The Jew & the Carrot has put together a list of healthy and sustainable ways to celebrate Purim. Just because Esther saved the Jews, doesn’t mean you can’t take this time to save the Earth.
  6. Check out The Jewish Week’s interview with author Rabbi Yehuda Landy about his book Purim and the Persian Empire: A Historical, Archaeological & Geographical Perspective, which examines archaeological findings from where the Purim story takes place.
  7. Though it was yesterday, learn about the Fast of Esther and some other lesser known fast days from our friends at My Jewish Learning.

If you know of any other great Purim blog posts and articles that we forgot to mention, let us know in the comment section. And we would be remiss not to mention JT Waldman’s stunning graphic novelization of the story of Esther:  Megillat Esther.

We hope you all have a Purim Sameach (a happy Purim)!

-Jill Finkelstein

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One Month’s Worth of Ideas

Posted by Alx in Jewish Books on February 16, 2010

Daniel Sieradski, a prominent blogger in the Jewish community, recently began a new blog called “31 Days, 31 Ideas.”  The basic gist of this month-long blog was to present his innovative ideas of ways to improve upon the Jewish community at a time when our society is progressing forward at an unprecedented rate, and to ultimately generate support for these ideas in order for them to come into fruition.

For the most part, Daniel’s ideas are original and pretty novel in my opinion (although he does lend credit where credit is due); and most have something to do with the Internet. All of these ideas were fascinating and though-provoking, but several of them seemed worth creating conversation about.

I encourage you to check out Daniel’s blog for yourself, but in the meantime, here are a few of the ideas that I felt were worth sharing:

  1. Open Source Beit Midrash – an online study hall that uses web conferencing and video chatting in order to have multiple people looking at the same page of text, with a teacher guiding a live, video-enabled lecture. This type of website could forever change the study of Jewish texts across the world.
  2. Jew It Yourself: The Jewish Catalog 2.0 – This would provide online resources that facilitate self-directed Jewish learning and practice to those who do not affiliate Jewishly in traditional ways or who do not have access to a Jewish education
  3. Jewish Book of the Month Club – as an avid reader with a love for learning about the Jewish community, I am obviously a fan of this idea, and am confused as to why this never existed?
  4. Jewish Non-Profit Employees Union – a union for the tens of thousands of employees of all non-profit Jewish organizations, ranging from day schools, synagogues, JCC’s, to advocacy groups, with Jewish and non-Jewish employees alike.

 

These concepts definitely bring a new perspective to the Jewish community table. And with a new Jewish experience just at our fingertips, Daniel’s ideas could potentially be the change the community needs for revitalization.

-Emily

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The E-Book Face-Off

Posted by Alx in Jewish Books on February 4, 2010

 I’m sure most of you by now have read all about the Amazon-Macmillan face-off that happened over this past week. If not, I shall summarize.

 

On Friday afternoon, after months of debates over e-book pricing, Amazon drastically pulled all Macmillan (one of the top six American publishing companies) e-books and print books off of their virtual shelves.

Amazon e-books currently sell $9.99, and Macmillan wants to charge between $12.99 and $14.99. Macmillan and other publishers have criticized Amazon for this low price on best-selling e-books, saying the price could potentially hurt hardcover sales.

Just 3 days later, Amazon threw in the towel and agreed to sell Macmillan e-books at their demanded price. Amazon says it had no choice in the matter, having to cede pricing control to Macmillan even though that meant increasing its e-book prices, and therefore decreasing the attractiveness of the Kindle.

Now, let us not forget that up until Tuesday, a publisher like Macmillan had no real alternative if it was unhappy with Amazon’s e-book prices. But when Apple announced its iPad and an upcoming iBook store last week, the e-book landscape changed. Five publishers were announced to be working with Apple, and Macmillan is one of them.

The basic consensus of this weekend’s events is that Amazon was in the wrong, and in many ways. They (allegedly) toyed with antitrust federal laws, stealthily removed Macmillan books in a shady manner, acted not only against Macmillan but against its authors too, and failed to come out with a formal statement (as Macmillan’s CEO did).

Whichever side you’ve decided to take, we cannot deny the role the e-book will play in the future of the publishing industry. But is this faceoff a foreshadowing of what’s to come? And did Amazon mistakenly pave the way for the Apple iPad to take over?

Needless to say, the coming months will surely not be void of excitement in the world of e-books.

-Emily

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Reviving the Classics

Posted by Alx in Jewish Books, Jewish Innovation, Jewish Knowledge, JPS Books on January 28, 2010

We’re going back to basics! As a part of our spring 2010 collection, we have re-launched five of JPS’s classic books! These classic books are for readers of all ages, and we hope that by bringing them back to the shelves, readers will be reminded of some timeless ideas that are essential to Judaism.

Lessons learned in these classic books carry as much weight as ever, containing information that, believe it or not, may be directly applicable to our lives today.

Here is a list of JPS works revived in 2010:

  1. Judaism as a Civilization by Mordecai Kaplan

This book introduced a new way of looking at Judaism, and is considered the origin of the Reconstructionist Movement. Kaplan felt that all Jews – traditional and liberal, religious and secular – could play a part in this “reconstruction.”

2. Book of Tradition by Abraham ibn Daud (author) and Gerson D. Cohen (translator)

This epic on Jewish history from ancient times to the 12th century eulogized Spanish Jewry and reminded readers of a once-thriving culture. No one before had ever attempted to write such a broad history of Jewish civilization, and this unique book is one of the first examples of Jewish historiography

3. Genesis: The Beginning of Desire by Avivah Gottlieb Zornberg, Ph.D.

This epic breathes new life into the stories of Adam and Even, Noah, Abraham and Sarah, Isaac, Jacob and Essau, Rachel, and Joseph. Zornberg brings biblical, midrashic, and literary sources together, illuminating the tensions that grip human beings as they search for an encounter God

4. The Life of Gluckel of Hameln  by Beth-Zion Abrahams

Gluckel of Hameln’s memoir is widely viewed as one of the earliest major works written by a Jewish woman and has become a classic. This JPS book is the only English translation of Gluckel’s story from the original Yiddish and is widely considered the most accurate and complete translation available

5. Modern Poems on the Bible  by David Curzon

This is a collection of imaginative and engaging contemporary responses to the Bible. Guided by the classic rabbinic genre of midrash conceived 1,500 years ago, Curzon chooses poems from Jewish and non-Jewish writers alike and places them besides the biblical passages that were their inspiration.

After all, Albert Einstein once said: “Somebody who reads only newspapers and at best the books of contemporary authors’ looks to me like an extremely nearsighted person who scorns eyeglasses.” We’ve certainly learned a lesson or two from Albert, so perhaps we should take his advice!

-Emily

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