Abigail Green
Shylock at the Barricades
The new production of The Merchant of Venice is both revolutionary and timely. It’s also deeply disappointing.
The (Railroad) Baron
How the man who built the Orient Express lost track of his legacy.
Mansions, Museums, and Magen Davids
In building (or rebuilding) grand houses in France and England Jewish immigrants created, brick by brick, edifices within their countries’ histories. Not all would survive World War II.
Remembering the Plutocrat and the Diplomat
Most things in Berlin speak to the city’s troubled past, and the newly opened James Simon Galerie is no exception.
One Nation, Two Disraelis
In locating Disraeli within modern Jewish history, the late David Cesarani engages with a tradition that he traces back to Hannah Arendt and Isaiah Berlin, who placed Disraeli’s Jewishness at the heart of his private life, his novels, his political thought, and his career as a politician.
Karl Marx, Bourgeois Revolutionary
Jonathan Sperber's new biography paints Karl Marx as a surprisingly conventional 19th-century paterfamilias.