Writing

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Collection

Bertha Klausner

Bertha Klausner was an influential literary agent in New York and Los Angeles. One of the earliest female literary agents, she represented major writers and cultural figures throughout the twentieth century.

Gabriele Tergit

Rising to prominence as a journalist in Weimar-era Berlin, Gabriele Tergit, née Elise Hirschmann (1893–1982), was an important chronicler of German-Jewish life. In her journalistic writings and novels, Tergit wrote biting social satires, sweeping panoramic novels, and lucid, hard-hitting commentaries on current events. A liberal whose writings reveal her strong commitments to social justice, women’s rights, and humanism, Tergit was forced to flee Germany in 1933 and settled permanently in London in 1938.

Selina Solomons

Selina Solomons was a turn-of-the-twentieth-century activist and writer, best known for her leadership role in the 1911 suffrage campaign that granted California women the right to vote. Solomons belonged to a prominent Jewish American family and spent her life in the San Francisco Bay Area. She employed multiple genres in advocacy of women’s rights, including speeches, poetry, drama, short fiction, and a manual-cum-suffrage history titled How We Won the Vote in California

Bonus Episode: Our Hot Summer Picks

In this special summer episode, Judith, Nahanni, and Jen each share something they've read, watched, or listened to this summer that Can We Talk? listeners will love.

Consecration of the Aleph Bet Book Cover

Q & A with Brazilian Poet Leonor Scliar-Cabral

Deborah Leipziger

JWA chats with Brazilian poet Leonor Scliar-Cabral as she launches her new book, Consecration of the Aleph Bet. 

Topics: Poetry

Yonit Naaman featured in an episode of "A Tale of Five Poets"

June 24, 2018

Poet Yonit Namaan was born in Yehud, Israel, in 1975 to Yemenite parents. On June 25, 2018, she was featured in the episode “Spleen and Failure” of the web series A Tale of Five Poets, which offers a close look into the lives and minds of five prominent Israeli poets. 

'Smashing the Tablets' Book Cover - Cropped

Midrash for a New Generation

Sarah Groustra

This bold anthology reimagines biblical stories through modern voices and identities.

Jacqueline Shohet Kahanoff

Jacqueline Shohet Kahanoff was an Egyptian-Jewish essayist, novelist, journalist, and literary critic. She is best known for promoting “Levantinism,” a social model for coexistence in Israel—a concept she articulates most fully in her “A Generation of Levantines” essays (1959). Her writings have inspired generations of Sephardi and Mizrahi writers in Israel.

Eliza Davis Initiates Correspondence with Charles Dickens

June 22, 1863

Eliza Davis, a Jewish Englishwoman, is renowned for her courageous correspondence with Charles Dickens regarding his derogatory portrayal of Jewish characters, particularly Fagin in Oliver Twist. Her letters, spanning from 1863 to 1867, reflect the blossoming confidence of English Jews and their advocacy for fair representation in literature. 

Collage of books about Jewish motherhood

Reading Jewish Motherhood in Full Color

Zia Saylor

This Mother’s Day, explore Jewish motherhood in all its nuance with books that go far beyond the clichés.

Elaine Showalter

Elaine Showalter is a pioneer of feminist criticism. She is best known for inventing the term “gynocriticism,” a new theoretical framework that argued that that women had been using the language of men for far too long and that they needed to develop a new critical approach to better understand the female subcultures that operate within male-dominated power structures. 

English-Language American Jewish Women’s Magazines, 1895-1945

In the first half of the twentieth century, Jewish women published a wide array of magazines, bulletins, and newsletters, which displayed their skills as writers and editors. These publications served as tools for communication, publicity, and education and provided platforms for the diverse ideologies and perspectives of Jewish women.

Birth of Yiddish poet and novelist Ida Maze

July 9, 1893

As an influential Jewish author and communal leader, Ida Maze played a crucial role in helping fellow Jewish writers flee Europe after World War II by securing Canadian entry visas for them and helping to publish their works. Maze was part of a greater population of Yiddish-language speakers and writers in Montreal who cultivated community through their shared love for Jewish culture. 

"The Postcard" by Anne Berest (cover)

"The Postcard" Explores the Names We Carry

Abby Richmond

As Berest searches for the sender of a mysterious postcard, she uncovers deeper questions about identity, intergenerational trauma, and what it means to carry a name.

Collage with an image of Mary Shelley and of Frankenstein's monster

The Identity of the Teenage Girl, From Mary Shelley to Lisa Frankenstein

Dany Dorsey

Mary Shelley, in all her unconventional womanhood, wrote the ultimate tale of misfits. Frankenstein meditates on nature, human limitations, the price of advancement, and the repercussions of the pursuit of knowledge.

Topics: Fiction
Elana Sztokman Headshot 2025 and Book Cover

Elana Sztokman on Her New Book, "In My Jewish State"

Janice Weizman

JWA talks to Elana Sztokman about her new book, In My Jewish State, which explores her political and religious transformation and her work for a better future in Israel. 

Ariella Azoulay in black shirt with gold bib necklace; cover image with Golden Thread and author name

Q & A with Ariella Aïsha Azoulay, Author of "Golden Threads"

Sarah Groustra

JWA chats with Ariella Aïsha Azoulay, author of Golden Threads, a new children’s book that explores the melting pot of Jewish and Muslim artisan communities in 1920s Morocco. 

Topics: Fiction, Children
Images of The Witches with pages of a book

Examining the Antisemitism of Roald Dahl’s The Witches

Charli Duchalski

I realized that the book promoted a cartoonish antisemitism that went completely over my head as a child.

Topics: Fiction
Marge Piercy cropped

Q & A with Poet Marge Piercy

Deborah Leipziger

JWA talks to poet Marge Piercy about her latest book, self-care, and fighting for causes you believe in. 

Topics: Poetry, Protests

Mae Rockland Tupa

Mae Rockland Tupa (b. 1937) is an accomplished multimedia artist and author whose prolific work has helped shape the field of Jewish Americana. Her work, including papercuts, prints, and textiles, explores themes of Jewish identity, history, and culture. She has published seven books, including the pioneering 1973 text The Work of Our Hands: Jewish Needlecraft for Today. Her work is housed in the collections of numerous institutions, such as The Jewish Museum in New York City.

Collage of 4 women poets

Four Women Who Shaped Jewish Poetry

Mildred Faintly

Writing in German, Yiddish, and Hebrew, these four Jewish women poets, transformed language, identity, and poetry itself—yet their names remain overlooked in literary history.

Topics: Poetry

Blanche Bendahan

Blanche Bendahan, born in Algeria in 1893, to a Sephardi father and a Catholic mother, became a renowned writer, poet, and political activist. One of her most famous works, Mazaltob, addressed themes of tradition versus modernity, women's rights, and the intersections between Jewish, Muslim, and Christian communities. She continued to write about her homeland until her death in 1975, combining her multicultural background with modernist style.

"Scrolls of Deborah" cropped

"The Scrolls of Deborah" Celebrates Women's Resilience

Zia Saylor

Through lyrical prose, Esther Goldenberg gives voice to an overlooked biblical heroine and reveals the power of female connection. 

Topics: Fiction, Bible

Bonus Episode: Sonnet for America: Reprise

Just over eight years ago, Judith and Nahanni were looking for solace after Donald Trump rode a xenophobic, misogynistic and hate-filled campaign to his first presidential victory. In a November 2016 episode of Can We Talk?, we turned to the poet Emma Lazarus, the Jewish woman who gave the statue of liberty a voice and transformed her into the symbolic mother of exiles. Now, as President Trump turns refugees and asylum seekers away, tightens our borders, and orders the deportation of thousands of immigrants, that conversation feels relevant all over again. We begin our spring season in March. For now, we're sharing that 2016 episode about Emma Lazarus, "Sonnet for America."

Birth of Inez Bensusan, Australian playwright, actress, and suffragist

September 11, 1871

Inez Bensusan, an Australian and English playwright, actress, and suffragist, was born on September 11, 1871. She wrote and acted in many feminist plays and was active in multiple activist groups, often combining theater and feminism for a political cause.

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