Sample Sources
The sources below are those contained in our three curated collections—covering themes of Passover, Gender Roles, and Holocaust Resistance. They represent a fraction of the thousands of sources that will be available when the full site launches in 2024.
1948. A Soldier’s Tale: The Bloody Road to Jerusalem
At five o’clock in the morning our commanders stormed into the dormitories to wake us. No morning gymnastics. We are in a high state of alert. Our comrades who were on night duty report…
Aunt Joya
On rare occasions Aunt Joya di Pinso would come over, and whenever she came, the house would be full of good spirits. The minute she set foot on our threshold, pausing for a moment, as was…
The Pile
The next day Marcel Schwartz registered at the labor exchange. [ . . . ]
Ten days later he heard clearly and explicitly: Marcel Schwartz! With trembling hands, he took his work notice, went home to…
Early in the Summer of 1970
I believe I ought to go over the moment when I learned of his death once more.
A summer morning, the sky wide, June, last days of the school year. I rise late, faintly stunned, straight into the…
Sprinkler Hora
A gush of joy in the pipe,
The pipes, the arteries of the Negev,
This is the course of the song,
From the faucet to the clod
The water of the depths ascends.
A pump means bread!
Negev, Negev, what’s…
The Jews of the Diaspora, or the Minority Vocation
Certainly, the collective will of diaspora Jews is assured neither of success nor of perennial life. It is situated in history, subject to the erosion and constraints of history, equally conditioned…
The Last of the Just
[ . . . ] It seemed to him that an eternal silence was closing down upon the Jewish breed marching to slaughter—that no heir, no memory would supervene to prolong the silent parade of victims, no…
The Elected Member
When the bell rang, he heard Norman shout, “If that’s that shit Levy, tell him to piss off.”
Rabbi Zweck knew that Dr Levy must have heard through the door and he began apologising on his son’s behalf…
Beyond the Test
Information juive is back. For nearly fourteen years it was, under the aegis of the Jewish Algerian Committee for Social Studies, the voice of a community of almost 150,000 souls in Algeria; it…
The Sacrifice
The train was beginning to slow down again, and Abraham noticed lights in the distance. He shifted his body only slightly so as not to disturb the boy, and sank back into the familiar pattern of…
The Stutterer’s Suicide and the Psychiatrist’s Dream
“. . . Are you Jewish?”
“Of course, I am. I went to South America to escape persecution, not to enjoy the pleasant climate.”
“Well, I’m neither a practicing Jew nor a Zionist. In fact, I dislike any…
A Treasury of Yiddish Stories
Modern Yiddish literature focuses upon the shtetl during its last tremor of self-awareness, the historical moment when it is still coherent and self-contained but already…