“I’ve memorized Lerner and Golden / I feel like I’m almost a #Jew!” sang the late #protest #singer #PhilOchs. This might fall suspect on your ears, as he calls out noted #Jewish journalists of his era from a goyish philosemitic point of view.

What is not often discussed? #Ochs himself was Jewish, and this line was a bit of #political #satire. Perhaps you’ve never heard of him until now, but allow me to introduce you to this Jewish #protestsinger that more people should know about, especially in our current political climate.

His middle-class Jewish family moved around during his youth from #Texas to #NewYork and finally #Ohio. The young Ochs would turn out to be a clarinet prodigy who joined a university orchestra at age 15. Certainly talented enough to make your #bubbe’s upwardly-mobile #shtetl #neshume #kvell. But then his life would unwind, some say into madness, others would say into genius."

https://www.heyalma.com/the-jewish-protest-singer-more-people-should-know-about/

Super cool art exhibit.

"#Artist #AnnaKamyshan's '#Nabatele' — inspired by her own search for #Jewish belonging — opens at the #Venice Biennale in July.

Membranes, helium, some anchors and engineering, and a lot of history went into the floating home for those who have lived without ground.

Nabatele is a drifting #synagogue rising 25 metres above the #VenetianLagoon in the Collateral section of the 61st Venice Biennale International #Art Exhibition.

The ambitious #aerostatic project, a life-sized structure illuminated from within and shining over the waterway day and night, is inspired by the lost wooden #shtetl #synagogues of eastern #Europe and evokes the hidden synagogues which rose in the Republic of Venice some 500 years ago."

https://thecjn.ca/arts-culture/a-floating-shul-will-rise-over-venice-with-the-help-of-the-museum-of-jewish-montreal/

tickets have gone on sale for the event I've been working on preparing for a year, the Vancouver Peretz Centre's 80th anniversary banquet on May 23rd. I've been helping bring to life co-director Itamar's idea of a shtetl wedding themed gala, along with award-winning writer Jess Goldman and music arrangements by me🤓there are limited low cost tickets that will probably go fast if price is an issue.
https://www.peretz-centre.org/event-details-registration/peretzs-80th-anniversary-a-wedding-between-peretz-and-the-past-present-and-future

#klezmer #Yiddish #SecularJewishCulture #shtetl #anniversary #Vancouver

"#Writer, #critic, #cultural #commentator, #polyglot, and multilingual #translator #IlanStavans is very clear about his #Jewish heritage: His grandparents had been #Shtetl-dwellers in Eastern #Europe, in #Poland and the #Ukraine, and moved to #Mexico between 1919 and 1929 to flee #poverty, #antisemitism, and #pogroms. #Stavans was born in #MexicoCity in 1961 to an #Ashkenazi family.

This certitude differentiates Stavans from many of the characters in #ElIluminado, a #graphicnovel in #English and #Spanglish that Stavans co-#wrote with #illustrator and writer #SteveSheinkin. In the #book, some of the characters are crypto-#Jews and are not entirely sure of, but suspect or deny, their Jewish heritage.

El Iluminado was first published in 2012 by Basic #Books/Hachette. The University of #NewMexico Press republished it in March , because “the story is about #SantaFe and New Mexico, and is of this community,” says #UNM Press Director Stephen Hull."

https://www.santafenewmexican.com/pasatiempo/a-history-based-graphic-novel-tells-the-story-of-crypto-jews-in-new-mexico/article_8309195a-2f64-4d8a-af56-dd83b4e27529.html

"In his #novel #AFoolsKabbalah, #SteveStern #writes in a manic whirl of disturbing and hilarious images as he follows the great historian of #Jewish #mysticism #GershomScholem on his journey to gather up the remains of a vanished civilization."

"Steve #Stern’s new novel, A Fool’s #Kabbalah, is a #comedy about #tragedy and a tragedy about comedy. It is a #mystical #fable of real events and a realistic account of mysticism. There are Jewish #jokes and Jewish jokesters and #Nazis who torture and kill the jokesters. #Kafka, Kabbalah, #Zionism, and the #shtetl of #Zyldzce (pronounced, perhaps, as “zilch”); #WalterBenjamin, #HannahArendt, love for a #rabbi’s beautiful daughter, and an #occult midnight marriage to an unearthly albino girl in a white gauze dress; shit jokes, fart jokes, raw misery, deep #philosophy, brutal #history and brutal #fantasy, broken hearts and heartfelt joy—these exuberantly disparate topics are somehow, improbably, made to cohere."

https://www.nybooks.com/articles/2026/04/09/the-possibility-of-humor-fools-kabbalah-steve-stern/

#NewOpening | On September 20, 2025 The Lost Shtetl Museum in Šeduva welcomes visitors to discover the history of Jewish life in Lithuania | Details:

Lost Shtetl Museum | jewish history museum lithuania

#shtetl #jewsineasterneurope #lithuania #museum

Illustration by Issachar Ber Ryback, from Mayn horever heym : a gedekhenish (1922).

Source: Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library

https://pdimagearchive.org/images/423ffe87-d878-4279-a0e3-11c739650be8

#judaism #ukraine #shtetl #yiddish #jewish #movement #pogroms #art #publicdomain

#Montreal folks, I highly recommend this production which is playing at Quai des Brumes on Sept 21. I saw it here in Vancouver a few months ago and it's great, a very thoughtful reimagining of Jewish folklore to comment on how we engage with the past & heritage today. Live music with crankie and dramatic narration!
https://www.eventbrite.com/e/magid-ensemble-presents-shterna-the-lost-voice-montreal-tickets-1631850571989?aff=oddtdtcreator

#klezmer #theatre #Yiddish #folklore #shtetl