The Shmooze, The Yiddish Book Center's Podcast

Drawing from an in-depth oral history interview with Beyle Schaechter-Gottesman, a short documentary film is now in production. Christa Whitney, director of the Yiddish Book Center's Wexler Oral History Project, talks about the film, BEYLE, which explores the life and legacy of Yiddish activist and artist Beyle Schaechter-Gottesman. Born in Vienna in 1920 and raised in Czernowitz, Beyle came to th...

This week, artist Mark Podwal joins us to talk about his work, its influences, and his exhibit Kaddish for Dąbrowa Białostocka, which is on display at the Yiddish Book Center. Podwal may have been best known initially for his drawings on The New York Times Op-Ed page. In addition, he is the author and illustrator of numerous books and his work is included in museum collections worldwide. Most of t...

In a conversation with filmmakers Alix Wall and Marc Smolowitz, we learn about their collaboration on "The Lonely Child". Their film will tell the story of Yiddish poet Shmerke Kaczerginski’s song, “Dos Elnte Kind,” or “The Lonely Child,” which he wrote for Alix’s grandmother in 1943 while she was in the Vilna Ghetto. Alix’s vision for the film is “to engage those keeping the song alive in a dialo...

Caraid O’Brien, an accomplished writer, performer, director, translator, and a Yiddish Book Center alumna speaks with us about her work on and off the stage. An accomplished translator, her translation from the Yiddish of Sholem Asch’s "God of Vengeance" “set Show World aflame” according to the Village Voice. She is a three-time recipient of a new play commission from the National Foundation for J...

Eddy Portnoy, senior researcher and director of exhibitions at the YIVO Institute for Jewish Research, talks about his newly published compendium of stories, "Bad Rabbi and Other Strange but True Stories from the Yiddish Press." He introduces us to stories of thieves, wrestlers, poets, and beauty queens whose misadventures were immortalized in Yiddish newspapers from the 1880s to the 1930s. Episod...

Editors Eitan Kensky and Ozzy Irving Gold-Shapiro sit down to talk about a special "Pakn Treger Translation Issue" devoted to writing by women. This collection includes works of poetry, prose poetry, fiction, and memoir. We learn about the writers, the genres, and how this collection helps to address the relative scarcity of translations of Yiddish women writers. Episode 0156 August 27, 2017 Yiddi...

Director Joshua Z. Weinstein and leading character Menashe Lustig talk about the making of the newly released film, "Menashe." The film, performed in Yiddish, takes place in the Hasidic community of Borough Park, Brooklyn. The story is drawn from the real life of its Hasidic star Menashe Lustig. Episode 0155 July 26, 2017 Yiddish Book Center Amherst, Massachusetts

Ozzy Irving Gold-Shapiro tells us what it’s like to spend a year as a Yiddish Book Center Fellow. Ozzy's Fellowship year has been spent rummaging through the Center’s archives, creating metadata spreadsheets, cataloguing collections, writing articles about interesting finds, and working with the Center’s translation fellowship program. Episode 0154 July 15, 2017 Yiddish Book Center Amherst, Massac...

Mel Rosenthal, a retired Knopf production editor, worked with the early galleys of Grade's "The Rabbi's House." In our conversation he discusses the challenges of translation and the days spent working with the writer. Episode 0153 July 9, 2017 Yiddish Book Center Amherst, Massachusetts

Nora Paley, the co-editor of the recently published A Grace Paley Reader: Stories, Essays, and Poetry, talks about the life and work of her mother, writer Grace Paley. Nora explains, "who Grace Paley was and that she was my mother are naturally inseparable for me." Episode 0152 June 7, 2017 Yiddish Book Center Amherst, Massachusetts

Seth Rogovoy, who literally wrote the book on klezmer, gives us a sneak preview of the Yidstock (July 13-16, 2017) lineup, from concerts featuring Eleanor Reissa & Frank London’s Klezmer Brass All-Stars, the Andy Statman Trio, Alicia Svigals and Lauren Brody Duo, Ezekiel’s Wheels Klezmer Band, the Hankus Netsky and Eden MacAdam-Somer Duo, to Frank London’s multimedia oratorio A Night at the Old Ma...

This week we sit down with Andy Statman, one of the founders of the klezmer revival. He and Lisa talk about how he initially came to klezmer and the way that he and his fellow musicians brought this genre of music into a new light. Catch the Andy Statman Trio during this year's Yidstock on Sunday, July 16, here at the Center. Episode 0150 June 2, 2017 Yiddish Book Center Amherst, Massachusetts

Rose Waldman joins us this week to talk about her new translation of S. An-sky's Pioneers. She and Lisa discuss An-sky’s relatable, and sometimes autobiographical, characters and how these characters grapple with their identities as Jews during the Haskalah. Episode 0149 May 26, 2017 Yiddish Book Center Amherst, Massachusetts

This week we sit down with Abigail Pogrebin to speak about her latest book, My Jewish Year: 18 Holidays, One Wondering Jew. She and Lisa discuss the inspiration behind her book and the way her exploration of these holidays helped her understand her Jewishness in a new way. Episode 0148 May 19, 2017 Yiddish Book Center Amherst, Massachusetts

Award-winning cookbook author Joan Nathan took time to speak with us about her newest book, King Solomon's Table: A Culinary Exploration of Jewish Cooking from around the World. Nathan shares stories about her travels, which took her around the globe to chronicle and preserve the history of Jewish food, its roots, culture, and recipes. Episode 0147 May 12, 2017 Yiddish Book Center Amherst, Massach...

This week, we are joined by Riv-Ellen Prell, a professor at the University of Minnesota, to talk about Jewish summer camping in the United States in the 1950s and 1960s. Riv-Ellen discusses how the activities at these summer camps—from religious practice to outdoor adventuring—were geared toward creating a new kind of Jewish identity in the post-war period. Episode 0146 May 5, 2017 Yiddish Book Ce...

This week we are joined by Kristen Gresh, curator of the new exhibit at the Museum of Fine Arts Boston: "Memory Unearthed: The Lodz Ghetto Photographs of Henryk Ross." This exhibit, now on display, tells the intimate story of life in the ghetto through the lens of one of the few individuals who survived it. Episode 0145 April 28, 2017 Yiddish Book Center Amherst, Massachusetts

This week we are joined by writer and translator Curt Leviant, best known for his many novels and translations of famous Yiddish authors, including Chaim Grade and Lamed Shapiro. He speaks about the challenges of Yiddish translation and his two latest novels, and tells a surprising story involving Grade and a mistranslated expression about King Solomon. Episode 0144 April 21, 2017 Yiddish Book Cen...

This week we sit down with Loli Kantor, the photographer behind our newest visiting exhibit: Beyond the Forest: Jewish Presence in Eastern Europe. Loli talks about how a visit to Poland inspired an eight-year-long project that took her into homes, synagogues, and other community centers in Poland and Ukraine, where she got to know both the elderly Jewish population as well as younger people eager...

This week we are joined by Sandy Fox, a PhD candidate at NYU and the host of the popular Yiddish feminist podcast Vaybertaytsh. Sandy talks about her dissertation, on Jewish summer camps—which, interestingly, is not shaped by the years she spent at summer camp as a child. She also tells us what it’s like to write and produce a podcast about feminist topics—from fashion to midwifery—completely in Y...

This week we sit down with Alan Kaufman, owner of the Lower East Side-based shop The Pickle Guys, known for its specialty pickles and pickled fruits and vegetables. Alan reveals the secret to the perfect pickle, including the step-by-step process the pickle guys follow to achieve their signature crunch. Episode 0141 March 31, 2017 Yiddish Book Center Amherst, Massachusetts

Roger Horowitz, author of the recently published Kosher USA: How Coke Became Kosher and Other Tales of Modern Food, shares a few backstories from his book about the history of keeping kosher in America. He reveals how iconic products such as Coca Cola and Jell-O tried to become kosher, what made Manischewitz wine the first kosher name-brand product to gain a wide non-Jewish audience, and more. Epi...

Eric Byron joins us this week to speak about the Ellis Island sound archives, which include a collection of Yiddish phonographic recordings dating from the 1890s to 1930s. Byron shares the history of these recordings, which we were made for an audience of newly arrived immigrants, and cranks up his Victor phonograph to share a few treasures from the collection. Episode 0139 March 16, 2017 Yiddish...

This week we sat down with the Yiddish Book Center's own Eitan Kensky to talk about our newest publication, The Abandoned Book and Other Yiddish Stories. The book features thirty original translations of Yiddish works by both famous and lesser-known authors, culled from the many translations that have appeared in our magazine, Pakn Treger, since its second issue. Eitan talks about the fun and chal...

This week we sat down with Judah Cohen, an ethnomusicologist who focuses on the ways that Jewish communities are brought together by the music that they create and celebrate. From a young age, Judah was fascinated by the role music can play in shaping one's sense of self. Now, in his work, he explores how Jewish sound relates to Jewish identity. Episode 0137 March 3, 2017 Yiddish Book Center Amher...