The Dybbukast

This episode features a discussion between theatre dybbuk's artistic director, Aaron Henne, and Professor Carol Margaret Davison about Bram Stoker's  Dracula,  exploring the ways in which the societal concerns present at the time of its publication intersect with the prejudices and beliefs that are embedded in the text. Professor Davison acted as a consulting scholar on theatre dybbuk's new world...

This illuminated lecture features Professor Paul Lerner as he discusses the famous 1938 radio broadcast by Orson Welles of "The War of the Worlds" vis-à-vis analysis from Austrian Jewish media researcher (and later advertising exec) Herta Herzog, who studied audience reactions to the broadcast and argued that the tensions of the time – the rise of fascist movements, the growing likelihood of war –...

This illuminated lecture features Alan Niku as he seeks to answer these questions: How did Jews in Persia participate in Sufism before and after the appearance of Kabbalah? Is Sufism a fundamentally Islamic form of mysticism? And what Sufi influences are still tangible in the practices of Persian Jews today? This episode was recorded as a live presentation on July 11, 2024 at The Philosophical Res...

In this episode, presented in collaboration with The Magnes Collection of Jewish Art and Life at UC Berkeley, we explore “Lilith,” a short story by Primo Levi, featured in his 1981 collection  Moments of Reprieve . Dr. Francesco Spagnolo, Curator of The Magnes Collection and Professor of Music and Jewish Studies at UC Berkeley, discusses the ways in which “Lilith,” with its combination of memoiris...

In this episode, presented in collaboration with the Oregon Jewish Museum and Center for Holocaust Education (OJMCHE), we explore Fiction without Romance; or the Locket-Watch , a novel which was written by Maria Polack in the East End of London and published in 1830. Dr. Heidi Kaufman, Professor of English at the University of Oregon and Regional Museum Educator at OJMCHE, discusses the ways in wh...

This illuminated lecture brings together readings from the short play "The Marvelous Puppet Show" by Miguel de Cervantes, published in 1615, with a talk from Dr. Barbara Fuchs, Distinguished Professor of Spanish and English at UCLA and director of Diversifying the Classics. Dr. Fuchs reveals the ways in which Cervantes' uncannily prescient interlude dissects the foibles of belief and belonging and...

In this episode, presented in collaboration with Hebrew College, we begin by exploring two poems from the second half of the 19th century by prominent American poets. One, "The Jewish Cemetery at Newport," by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, is generally thought to have been written during a visit to Newport in 1852 and was then published in 1854. The other, a response to that work by Emma Lazarus, cal...

This guest episode from Primary Source , a limited series podcast from the Taube Center for Jewish Studies at Stanford University , explores the notorious and fraudulent antisemitic text most commonly known as The Protocols of the Elders of Zion , taking a look at its history and its impact on world politics. This episode from our colleagues is a meaningful companion to our popular Season 1 episod...

Dr. Jennifer Wells, former Assistant Professor of History and International Affairs at the George Washington University, takes us through the social, economic, and political landscape of Elizabethan England as Aaron Henne, the writer and director of our latest work,  The Merchant of Venice (Annotated), or In Sooth I Know Not Why I Am So Sad ,  and artistic director of theatre dybbuk, illuminates t...

This illuminated lecture brings together work from Dr. Daniel Pollack-Pelzner, Visiting Scholar at Portland State University and scholar-in-residence at the Portland Shakespeare Project, with readings of excerpts from Shakespeare's Merchant and other related materials. Dr. Pollack-Pelzner takes up the question: “Why perform The Merchant of Venice ?" and discusses its production history, scholarshi...

In this episode, presented in collaboration with the George Washington University Department of History, we examine the history of the word “ghetto" and look at ways that ideas contained in Shakespeare's play overlap with and deviate from that history. Dr. Daniel Schwartz, Professor of Jewish History at GW, guides us through this exploration, sharing some of the concepts contained in his book, Ghe...

In the concluding episode of our five-episode series in partnership with the Department of Near Eastern and Judaic Studies at Brandeis University and of our third season, we investigate the ways in which students respond to Jewish sacred texts. Throughout the episode, we present readings from the Torah and accompanying responses from students. Dr. Ziva Hassenfeld, the Jack, Joseph and Morton Mande...

In this fourth of our five-episode series in partnership with the Department of Near Eastern and Judaic Studies at Brandeis University, we explore The Book of Tahkemoni , a collection of tales written in Hebrew in the early 13th century. Authored by Yehuda Alharizi, who was born in Toledo, Spain in the middle of the 12th century, the book uses the structure of the Arabic literary form known as maq...

In this third of our five-episode series in partnership with the Department of Near Eastern and Judaic Studies at Brandeis University, we continue to explore the diverse interests of the NEJS Department by looking at a text from the beginnings of Christian monasticism in the Byzantine period.  The Sayings of the Desert Fathers and Mothers is a collection of short stories and sayings from and about...

In this second of our five-episode series with the Department of Near Eastern and Judaic Studies at Brandeis University (NEJS), we explore "The Imagined Childhood,” a short story originally published in Hebrew in 1979. Written by the prolific 20th-century Iraqi-born Israeli author Shimon Ballas, the story served as an epilogue to a collection of short stories whose narratives intersect with the au...

In this first of our five-episode series with the Department of Near Eastern and Judaic Studies at Brandeis University (NEJS), we explore a satirical text from 1897 titled The Chronicles of the Rabbis: Being an Account of a Banquet Tendered to “Episcopus” by the Rabbis of New York City upon the Anniversary of his 70th Birthday . Written by J.P. Solomon, the editor of a popular Jewish newspaper, un...

In this special guest episode from the American Academy of Religion , Dr. Geraldine Heng discusses the obstacles in conceptualizing race in premodernity and the evidence for racialized thinking in the European medieval period. Dr. Heng is professor of English and comparative literature, with a joint appointment in Middle Eastern studies and women’s studies at the University of Texas at Austin. She...

In this episode, presented in collaboration with the Jewish Museum of Maryland, we share selections from a speech by Rabbi Morris S. Lazaron, which was given at the convention of the Union of American Hebrew Congregations in 1937. Portions of this speech are featured along with excerpts from his unpublished autobiography in an article from the Museum's journal, Generations , titled “Why I Was a Zi...

In this episode, presented in collaboration with the Goldring/Woldenberg Institute of Southern Jewish Life, we investigate the life and work of the poet Chaya Rochel Andres, who emigrated as a young woman in 1921 from Poland to Dallas, Texas, where she spent most of her adult life. Her story serves as an entry point for us to explore some of the social, political, and cultural dynamics of Jewish l...

The Exagoge of Ezekiel the Tragedian is the earliest documented Jewish play, thought to have been written in Alexandria, Egypt in the second century BCE.  From the fragments that remain, we know that it tells the biblical Exodus narrative in the style of a Greek tragedy. In 2016, theatre dybbuk combined the extant 269 lines with modern-day stories of refugees, immigrants, and other voices from the...

In our seventh episode of the season, we explore  Sound in the Silence , a historical education project that uses the group creation of performance to personalize remembrance on-site where history happened. The project has largely centered on spaces connected to the Holocaust, partnering with a variety of organizations working with young people and community members from throughout Europe. This ep...

On October 12, 1958, in the midst of the civil rights movement, a bomb was detonated at The Temple – a synagogue in Atlanta, GA. In our sixth episode of the season, presented in collaboration with The Temple, we explore The Temple Bombing, a play written by Jimmy Maize about the events surrounding that bombing. The play premiered at the Alliance Theatre in 2017 and was inspired by the book of the...

In our fifth episode of the season, presented in collaboration with Lilith magazine, we explore the Yiddish short story “The New World,” written by Esther Singer Kreitman in the first half of the twentieth century. The English translation by Barbara Harshav, which you can hear excerpts from in the episode, was published in Lilith in 1991. Dr. Anita Norich, Professor Emerita of English and Judaic S...

In our fourth episode of the season, presented in collaboration with The Mervis Chair, Borns Jewish Studies Program, Indiana University Bloomington, we explore a series of letters which document a moment in the late 1860s when opposing viewpoints caused a split in the Hebrew Congregation of St. Thomas. Dr. Laura Leibman, Professor of English and Humanities at Reed College shares about the history...

In this episode, presented in collaboration with the Australian Centre for Jewish Civilisation, Monash University, we investigate Sing This at My Funeral: A Memoir of Fathers and Sons , written by David Slucki and published in 2019. The title of the book references "Di Shvue" – the anthem of the Jewish Labor Bund. Dr. Slucki, the Loti Smorgon Associate Professor in Contemporary Jewish Life and Cul...