Rivki Silver from Life in the Married Lane organized a Jewish women’s roundtable, Orthodox Women Talk. Today’s topic is how to deal with long services in synagogue when you may or may not understand the language. 7 bloggers — including me — give responses over at this week’s host’s, Keshet Starr’s, blog. I found myself agreeing with a lot of what the other women said (okay, pretty much all of it). One of the things that I liked most was that the women selected reflect different stages of life and different backgrounds. Check it out. (If you’re so inclined…)
Jewish
Writing ethics: Defining your voice by what you don’t write about as much as what you do
Okay, so last week I mentioned how much I admired Nina Badzin’s article for TC Jew Folk, “Things I Don’t Write about on the Internet.”
I pretty much agreed with her on all points, although I will occasionally get political. (This is pretty much conditioning on my part: no meal shared with my family during the 1980s did not involve bashing of the Republican Party, so far as I can remember. But my memory might be faulty. Not that I’m a Democrat. Currently, my party membership is officially “decline to state.” You can do that in California.)
Anyway, there was one thing not on Nina’s list I kept thinking about while reading it, and it has haunted me ever since:
I DON’T TELL OTHER PEOPLE’S STORIES.
What are “other people’s stories?” Continue reading
Stopgap measure: 4 (okay, it’s really 5) totally awesome literary links
Sorry for the recent lack of posts. Camp was out, day school was still out, kids were home, and Mr. K. started his school year the second week of August. As you can imagine, I’ve been a little busy…the only significant writing I’ve done in the last several week has been a few episodes of my serial.
I’ve got kids home from school for one more day, but recently I’ve been seen some really interesting stuff out there on the web which I believe will be of interest to followers of this blog. So I’m posting those links in lieu of a truly original post by yours truly (although I’ve got an idea about what I want to post next).
Top 4 Cool Things I’ve Seen on the Internet Recently:
- If you haven’t seen it yet, this is the best analysis of Israel media coverage ever, with fascinating insider details.
- Hevria is the new project of Elad Nehorai from PopChassid. He’s brought together an amazing range of writers to solve problems in the Jewish community through positive action and creativity.
- The L.A. Times periodically publishes poetic op-eds. Here’s the latest bunch.
- And finally, the geektastic interview with Rabbi Goldfeder about how truly intelligent robots MIGHT actually count in a minyan. I’ve actually had an idea for a SF story for a while with robots, and Rabbi Goldfeder’s research will definitely come in handy.
Hopefully, I’ll be ready to publish the aforementioned post later this week. As a teaser, I’ll tell you that it is partly based on Nina Badzin’s essay from earlier this summer about the things she doesn’t write about. So I guess that’s link #5.
Have you read any of those articles? What did you think? Share your opinions in the comments.
Getting booed at Tablet and my first appearance in The Jewish Press
I had a bad feeling when my editor at Tablet — who I really love — sent me an email telling me that my latest essay there (about how I unintentionally set my hand on fire but believe it was no accident) would run on Tisha B’Av.
Being an Orthodox Jew, I pretty much regard that as the worst day of the year, so I was immediately filled with a sense of foreboding. And it now seems I was right to be Continue reading
The new Tablet story my editor is afraid I’m going to get hate mail for
My newest piece is up on Tablet. When I submitted the pitch several months ago to the Life and Religion editor, Wayne Hoffman, he cautioned me: do you really want to do this?
The topic of the essay is a controversial one in the Jewish community — women wearing Tefillin — and he was afraid I’d get a lot of trolls. And probably some genuine hate mail, to boot.
My original proposal was a much wider topic — the denigration of traditional feminine roles by many “feminists” in the Jewish community. I shot off the query letter in a fit of pique after yet another feminist looked down her nose at my lifestyle and basically told me I was so persecuted I didn’t know that I was persecuted.
The first draft was a mess: too big, too venting, too…too…everything.
I have to really give credit to the very special Mr. Hoffman, who asked the right questions and nudged me in the right direction until I could be proud of the resulting essay. We cut most of the first draft, and narrowed the topic considerably, then tried to focus on the positive aspects of the story.
Anyway, I hope you check the essay out and share and comment and all that.
Still need a daisy? 6 years of Raizy
My picture book, A Dozen Daisies for Raizy, has now been out for six years. With Shavuos just around the corner, I know that parents and teachers will be teaching about the holiday –some using my book, some not — and I thought I’d provide a few links to help them. Continue reading
Rebecca Klempner 