Two Jews Talking: A Lifelong Learning Class with Murray Baumgarten
Past SessionsWednesday, January 20, 2021 • 7 Sh'vat 5781 - 7:00 PM - 8:00 PM
Wednesday, January 13, 2021 • 29 Tevet 5781 - 7:00 PM - 8:00 PM
Wednesday, January 6, 2021 • 22 Tevet 5781 - 7:00 PM - 8:00 PM
Modern Jewish Writing
Murray Baumgarten, Distinguished Emeritus Professor of English and Comparative Literature, founding director of UCSC Jewish Studies Program.
Modern Jewish literature emerges from Yiddish, the "secret language of the Jews,” and our discussions will focus on how it continues as "Two Jews Talking." This three-session class will focus on modern Jewish writing.
January 6: Youtube reading of Sholem Aleichem’s story On Account of a Hat . Here is the text
January 13: Poetry by the Israeli poets Zelda, Hayyim Nachman Bialik,and the American writer, Bernard Malamud's The Jewbird
January 20: The Water Queen of Jerusalem poem by Israeli Rachel Chalfi, and The Mistress, by the American writer, Lara Vapnyar
We should have lots of fun reading and discussing these writers.
1. Each of us has a Name, poem by Zelda
2. On Account of a Hat – Sholom Aleichem – a reading on YouTube. About 20 minutes
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=03E7Q9wHG4. Here is the text.
3. The Water Queen of Jerusalem, poem by Rachel Chalfi http://www.zeek.net/606chalfi/
4. The Mistress, by the American writer, Lara Vapnyar
5. To the Bird (El Hatzipor) by Hayyim Nachman Bialik A Musical Version and an English translation
Biographical notes:
Lara Vapnyar -- Born in 1971 in Moscow, Russia, came to US in 1994, pregnant with her first child, to the new world -- see "My Story"- What is an American?
Bernard Malamud -- Born in 1914 - in Brooklyn, NY, dies in 1986 in Manhattan-- one of a group of American Jewish writers who emerged in 1950s on as exploring what it means to be an American including Saul Bellow, and Philip Roth
Sholem Aleichem -- born in 1859 -- in Ukraine, dies in New York in 1916 - it was the largest funeral in New York city history. More than 100,000 people lined the sidewalk to honor him as he was taken to the Educational Alliance building in the lower East Side of New York for a funeral service before burial in Mt. Nebo cemetery in Queens. In his Ethical Will he asks that on the anniversary of his death people gather and read some of his stories aloud. He wrote in Yiddish.
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