On the Nose - The Inheritance of Defeat

From the Shoah to McCarthyism to the failures of the New Left, it has been a long 20th century for radical Jews. Each new iteration of the Jewish left finds itself building on a legacy that has been largely buried, learning from a history of defeat at the hands of much more powerful forces. Given those losses, what do we inherit from both our movement ancestors and our actual kin? How does their example shape the way we organize in the present? Are there models from which we might learn? Or must we create something new for every new moment? On this episode of On the Nose, recorded live from a panel at Jewish Currents Live on October 11th, Arielle Angel tackles these questions with artist and writer Molly Crabapple, author Harriet Clark, and poet and activist Irena Klepfisz.

Thanks to Jesse Brenneman for editing and to Nathan Salsburg for the use of his song “VIII (All That Were Calculated Have Passed).”

Links and Further Reading

“The Hill,” On the Nose, Jewish Currents

“Here Where We Live Is Our Country,” On the Nose, Jewish Currents

“For Eli Jacobson” by Kenneth Rexroth

“Beyond Grievance,” Arielle Angel, Jewish Currents

“The Work of Love in Recollecting One Who is Dead,” Sören Kierkegaard, Works of Love