The Naomi Prawer Kadar International Yiddish Summer Program, which has successfully been training students for several years at the Tel Aviv University, is now registering new paticipants for the upcoming study season. This year, the studies will take place on the university’s campus, starting from July 5 to August 1.
The Yiddish-Russian newspaper Birobidzhaner Shtern has published a special jubilee issue dedicated to the life and work of Emmanuil Kazakevich (1913-1962), born 110 years ago. A variety of materials, including new translations of his poetry, appeared in both Yiddish and Russian.
Emmanuil Kazakevich was a prominent Soviet writer, poet and translator who lived in Birobidzhan from 1931 till 1938, where he organized the Jewish youth theater, directed the Birobidzhan State Jewish Theater (BirGOSET), served as the chairman of the regional Yiddish radio, worked as a staff member and the head of Birobidzhaner Shtern’s literary section. Kazakevich also translated numerous plays for the Jewish theater into Yiddish.
On February 22, the Jewish Community Center of St. Petersburg hosted a lecture by the writer, poet and journalist Yoel Matveyev, dedicated to the themes of taiga and tundra in Yiddish poetry. Matveyev demonstrated to the city’s Yiddishists how Jewish folklore and mysticism, especially Hasidism in the 18th-19th centuries, influenced the perception of some Ashkenazi Jews of wildlife and forests as a special sacred space, which was reflected in the works of many Yiddish poets and writers. The event was held entirely in Yiddish.
On February 17, the Habima Theater in Tel Aviv hosted a event celebrating one of the most famous veterans of the Israeli theatrical stage, actor and director Shmuel Atzmon (born in 1929). Habima is the famous historical symbol of modern Hebrew theater. The event was named after Atzmon’s 2022 book: Kholem be-Yiddish (Hebrew: “Dreaming in Yiddish”).
Although this theater is strongly associated with Hebrew, the celebration was held in both Hebrew and Yiddish. It included performances by the actors of the Habima Theater, where Shmuel Atzmon performed for many years, and of the Yiddish theater Yiddishpil, which he founded in Tel Aviv in 1987, thereby realizing his own dream of preserving and developing the tradition of Yiddish theatrical art.
On February 16, Russian cinemas hosted the premiere of the film The Righteous directed by Sergei Ursulyak and dedicated to the heroic feat of the Soviet partisan Nikolai Kisilev (1913-1974) who saved more than 200 Jews from the Dolginovo Ghetto (Minsk District of Belarus).
In August-October 1942, Kisilev managed to walk the Jews through forests out of the front line. In 2005, the Israeli state memorial Yad Vashem awarded him with the title of Righteous Among the Nations. Ursulyak’s new film is notable for containing numerous phrases in Yiddish, as well as the Yiddish song “Lomir ale ineynem” (“Let’s all together”), featured as the film’s theme song.
For several years, initiated by the local Yiddishists and supported by the town’s administration, Ashkelon has hosted an annual festival of Yiddish songs known throughout Israel. On February 8, this seaside town hosted the grand opening of the local Yiddish Lovers’ Club. Its organizers hope to make the cultural life in Ashkelon, as well as the Yiddish cultural scene in general, more intense and diverse.