Miscellany Word from: David

Exclusive! You-know-who has entered the rap game. Nu, it was a mistake from a book review in the usually sharp Jewish Chronicle of London. On further reflection, the only Hasid ever to appear in rap video was an anonymous man briefly seen in Jay-Z's '99 Problems.' Producer Rick Rubin makes a cameo appearance and either is channeling the spirit of Flushing Avenue or Z.Z Top.

A final point about N'Awlins. Before Juvenile, Dr. John, even before Louis Armstrong, there was a part-Jewish composer named Louis Moreau Gottschalk who was 'America's first regional and multicultural composer' and precursor to Jazz'. Another local M.O.T is author and poet Roger Kamenetz who is best known for a book called 'The Jew In the Lotus' but I'm partial to him for ripping T.S Eliot in a poem called 'The Lower Case Jew.'

I should also point out that 'Exquisite Corpse', the title of the journal in which Kamenetz's poem was published has nothing to do with the aforementioned Dead Poet or a new film directed by Tim Burton. (Exquisite Corpse is in fact a fun game poets play-where they write a line, their neighbor writes another, then hides previous lines. The results are often deeply profound and hilarious.) Michael Atkison claims that the 'Corpse Bride' "...isn't roughly "based on a Russian folktale" but a knowing thievery from S.Y. Agnon and Sholom Aleichem, who in turn made their careers converting centuries of Jewish mythology into fiction."
Mr. Atkinson has it half right-to be sure, anything Judaic has been banished from this film-perhaps because it would complicate the story. However, the Yiddish writers who really mastered the macabre include S. Anski, author of 'The Dybuk' and collector of folk tales, I.B Singer, and whoever else was featured in 'Yenne Velt' a masterful compilation of Jewish occult stories compiled by Joachim Neugroschel. So fear not, there are plenty of films touching on the Jewish experience being shown in NYC area. The most prominent may be Ushpizin, where a Bratzlav Hasid is visited by gangster friends from his past. 'Medurat HaShevet' or Campfire, Joseph Cedar's film about the founding of a settlement in 1981, is playing in a few theaters. There are less likable Israelis seen in 'Lord of War', Paradise Now, and 'Avenge But One of My Two Eyes. And last but not least is 'Everything is Illuminated.' I'll leave the post about how great it is to the legions of Elijah Wood, Liev Schrieber, Jonathan Safran Foer, and Eugene Hutz fans out there.

Where have all the comments gone...long gone comments...long, long time ago...