Books

Truth or Dare?

Reinterpreting Al-Harīrī’s Arab Rogue. The Markaz Review, 2021 A new English translation of Impostures from Basra-born Al-Harīrī (aka the Arab poet known as Abū Muhammad al-Qāsim ibn Alī ibn Muhammad…

Davide Rodogno’s Night on Earth

A complex and fascinating mosaic of the Western Humanitarian Organizations activities in the Near East After World War One One of the most impactful aspects of the International Museum of…

Always Remember Your Name

A memoir by Andra and Tatiana Bucci. Forward by Ruth Franklin Andra and Tatiana Bucci, Always Remember Your Name, translated by Ann Goldstein. Astra House By all rights, this book…

Rider on blue paper, ca. 1901-1907 , pencil on blue paper, National Library of Israel

Franz Kafka: With Ink and Graphite

 I love and admire Kafka because he writes in a way that is totally closed off to me. (Primo Levi) Franz Kafka The Drawings. Edited by Andreas Kilcher. Yale University…

Fragments from Elsa Morante’s La storia

Every so often, at night, the air-raid alarm sirens would resound through the city; but the people of San Lorenzo paid little attention to them, convinced that Rome would never…

The Racial Laws

The Racial Laws, a poem by Giorgio Bassani (translated by Jamie McKendrick) The magnolia right in the middle of our Ferrara house’s garden is the very same that reappears in…

The Novel of Ferrara

Introduction by Jamie McKendrick to his translation of The Novel of Ferrara (W.W. Norton & Co., 2019) In short stories, novels, poems, and essays, Giorgio Bassani has composed perhaps the…

Peter Cole

Hymns & Qualms: An Interview with Peter Cole

Dan Friedman, contributing editor of Sources. Originally published in “Sources: A Journal of Jewish Idea” Fall 2021. Reposted by permission. Image: Kelly Writers House. Peter Cole is one of the…

Under Gentile Eyes

Representations of the Jews and Judaism in Medieval and Modern Europe   Edited by Fabrizio Franceschini and Enrico Giaccherini Image: Venice, Esther Scroll, late 18th century, Florence, Jewish Museum   …