Keeping in sync with some 300 Jewish community centres across North America that have designated November as Jewish Book Month, Toronto’s Prosserman JCC and the Schwartz/Reisman Centre in Vaughan are presenting the third annual Jewish Book Festival, Nov. 15 to 29.
Thirteen newly published books are being celebrated at both locations in 15 days. What evidently makes the Toronto-area festival unique is the preponderance of local authors being highlighted, such as Alison Pick, whose rousing, high-profile memoir Between Gods won a Canadian Jewish Literary Award last month.
Several other of the local authors have also written on the Holocaust, a theme that was all but ignored for the first two decades of the postwar era but has increasingly come to dominate Jewish literary culture ever since.
Mordechai Ronen, a Holocaust survivor and veteran of the Israel Defence Forces discusses his memoir, I Am a Victor, co-written with Steve Paikin of TVO’s The Agenda.
Also, Eli Rubenstein, director of March of the Living Canada, makes a presentation on his book Witness: Passing the Torch of Holocaust Memory to New Generations; (see page 44) and Gail Benick discusses The Girl Who Was Born That Way, a book about a Jewish family that tried to bury its Holocaust past.
Toronto-based television news correspondent Martin Fletcher makes a return visit to the festival to discuss The War Reporter, a book about his journalistic experiences in Sarajevo, Bosnia and Serbia; and Torontonian Isme Bennie recounts the experience of growing up Jewish in South Africa in White Schooldays: Coming of Age in Apartheid South Africa.
Festival director Gustavo Rymberg and committee chair Sara Dobner worked for six months to organize the festival, which also features book sales and involves partnerships with various community organizations and retirement homes.
“We started working on this in May,” Rymberg said. “We attended the conference of the Jewish Book Council in New York and we met with 254 new authors. It was a good opportunity to meet them and to decide if their books would be of interest to our community.”
The festival opens with a presentation by Joshua Muravchik on his book Making David into Goliath: How the World Turned Against Israel, which traces the trends that shaped world opinion on Israel from 1967 to today and the new paradigm of leftist orthodoxy that turned the table against Israel. (Schwartz/Reisman, Nov. 15, 10 a.m.)
Other authors and books being celebrated are: Katja Goldman and Lisa Rotmil and their cooking book The Community Table; Leah Lax’s book Uncovered, How I Left Hasidic Life and Finally Came Home; Robin Berman’s Permission to Parent, How to Raise Your Child with Love and Limits; and Jessamyn Hope’s novel Safekeeping.
There are two free events for kids: Laura Gehl presents her children’s book Hare and Tortoise Race Across Israel, and Anna Levine presents Jodie’s Shabbat Surprise, about a dog that stumbles upon an archeological find near Jerusalem.
The Ventanas Trio performs a free closing concert featuring an energetic fusion of flamenco, Sephardic, North African, Balkan, Turkish and Greek influences. (Schwartz/Reisman Center, Nov. 29, 7 p.m.)
Tickets for paid events are $5. The festival schedule is accessible via its website.
