Hebrew

Book Review: A.B. Yehoshua’s “The Tunnel” — A Serious Romp about an Aging Brain

August 20, 2020
Posted in , ,

Exuberant is the right word for A.B. Yehoshua’s new novel, not only because of the story’s pile up of characters and events, but also for its prose.

Read More

Book Review: “The Story of Hebrew” — A Surprise Comeback

December 14, 2017
Posted in , ,

I cannot recall reading any book about Jewish history that contains so many “Aha!” moments.

Read More

Book Review: A. B. Yehoshua’s “The Extra” — A Genius for Dissecting Family Matters

June 27, 2016
Posted in , ,

This canny writer is concerned with the kind of complicated family relationships that engaged his Jewish literary forebears.

Read More

Theater Review: “The Strawberry Girl” — Harvest of Horror

September 24, 2015
Posted in , ,

Israeli Stage has opened its sixth season, which is dedicated exclusively to female playwrights, with a haunting work that examines the complicity of an ordinary German in the Holocaust.

Read More

Book Review: “The Book of Beginnings” — Vive les indifférences!

June 8, 2015
Posted in , , ,

This study is an attempt to “enter” a foreign way of thought and to study the “possibilities” and, by extension, “potential mindsets” of the human mind.

Read More

Book Review: “Second Person Singular”—A Powerful Look at Israel’s Tangled Issues of Identity

June 17, 2012
Posted in , ,

In his novel, Sayed Kashua paints such a vivid picture of modern Jerusalem that I found myself longing to see that city again; he also portrays a whole spectrum of Arab life in Israel — from the poor families visited by the social workers to the ambitious Arab mothers and their sometimes feckless sons — with empathy and humor.

Read More

Fuse Books: A Few Year End Literary Favorites

December 25, 2011
Posted in ,

As the year nears its end, time is running out to write at length about some of the new books that gave me pleasure. Thus this quick list of favorites. As usual, my taste runs to prose that’s off-the-beaten-path.

Read More

Book Review: A Fascinating Meditation on Jewish Maps of Time

April 14, 2011
Posted in

“Palaces of Time” is a exquisitely illustrated, elegantly written account of the history of Jewish calendars in early modern Europe, as well as a meditation on what they represented — profound reflections of the Jewish experience as it passed through time.

Read More

Recent Posts