Hillel Halkin's Books

A Complicated Jew

Selected Essays

By: Hillel Halkin

Write a review Read reviews Take a Quiz Solve Book Puzzle

Hillel Halkin is widely admired for his works of literary criticism, biography, fiction, and nonfiction, as well as for his celebrated achievements as a translator. Born and raised in New York City, he has lived most of his life in Israel. His complex sensibility, deeply rooted in Jewish literature and history no less than in his own personal experience, illuminates everything it touches. In A Complicated Jew, Halkin assembles a selection of essays that form, if not a conventional memoir, a haunting and intimate record of a profoundly Jewish life that defies categorization. It is a banquet for the mind. “Hillel Halkin is a master storyteller and a brilliant cultural critic, and in A Complicated Jew he combines both talents to take his readers on an intellectual thrill ride through his encounters with Jewish thought, art, and life. I envy him his lifetime of adventures and am grateful to him for sharing them with all of us.” Dara Horn, novelist and author of Eternal Life and People Love Dead Jews “I have been reading Hillel Halkin for well on to half a century, always deriving pleasure from his stately prose, intellectual profit from his deep learning, and inspiration from his integrity. I am pleased to think of him as my contemporary.” Joseph Epstein, author of Life Sentences: Literary Essays, Narcissus Leaves the Pool and Fabulous Small Jews, and former editor of The American Scholar. “Hillel Halkin himself has always been even more interesting to me than his highly interesting subjects, and here he gives us full access to his adventurous mind, the dazzling range of his learning, and his passionate spirit. More than a collection of essays, this book charts the intellectual journey of one of our most original Jewish writers.” Ruth Wisse, Professor emeritus of Yiddish and Comparative Literature at Harvard University and author of If Am Not for Myself: The Liberal Betrayal of the Jews, Jews and Power, and No Joke: Making Jewish Humor. “Even when Hillel Halkin exasperates, there is no voice on the contemporary Jewish scene more intellectually alert or lucid. The work of a cultural critic of rare breadth, this keenly personal, fiercely argued volume is as trenchant of tour of Jewry’s dilemmas of the last half-century as any I know.” Steven J. Zipperstein, Professor of Jewish Culture and History at Stanford University and author of Imagining Russian Jewry and Pogrom: Kishinev and the Tilt of History.

Average ratings

N/A

Write a review

Solve jigsaw puzzle

Age

Page Count

302

Publisher

Wicked Son

Published Date

ISBN 10

1642938114

ISBN 13

9781642938111

After One-Hundred-and-Twenty

Reflecting on Death, Mourning, and the Afterlife in the Jewish Tradition

By: Hillel Halkin

Write a review Read reviews Take a Quiz Solve Book Puzzle

After One-Hundred-and-Twenty

Reflecting on Death, Mourning, and the Afterlife in the Jewish Tradition

By: Hillel Halkin

A deeply personal look at death, mourning, and the afterlife in Jewish tradition After One-Hundred-and-Twenty provides a richly nuanced and deeply personal look at Jewish attitudes and practices regarding death, mourning, and the afterlife as they have existed and evolved from biblical times to today. Taking its title from the Hebrew and Yiddish blessing to live to a ripe old age—Moses is said to have been 120 years old when he died—the book explores how the Bible's original reticence about an afterlife gave way to views about personal judgment and reward after death, the resurrection of the body, and even reincarnation. It examines Talmudic perspectives on grief, burial, and the afterlife, shows how Jewish approaches to death changed in the Middle Ages with thinkers like Maimonides and in the mystical writings of the Zohar, and delves into such things as the origins of the custom of reciting Kaddish for the deceased and beliefs about encountering the dead in visions and dreams. After One-Hundred-and-Twenty is also Hillel Halkin's eloquent and disarmingly candid reflection on his own mortality, the deaths of those he has known and loved, and the comfort he has and has not derived from Jewish tradition.

Average ratings

N/A

Write a review

Solve jigsaw puzzle

Age

Page Count

232

Publisher

Princeton University Press

Published Date

ISBN 10

0691181160

ISBN 13

9780691181165

Yehuda Halevi

By: Hillel Halkin

Write a review Read reviews Take a Quiz Solve Book Puzzle

Yehuda Halevi

By: Hillel Halkin

A profile of the Zionist poet and philosopher offers insight into his representation of 11th- and 12th-century Andalusian Spain, analyzes the religious disciplines that informed his work and traces his fateful voyage to Palestine.

Average ratings

N/A

Write a review

Solve jigsaw puzzle

Age

Page Count

369

Publisher

Jewish Encounters

Published Date

ISBN 10

0805242066

ISBN 13

9780805242065

A Strange Death

By: Hillel Halkin

Write a review Read reviews Take a Quiz Solve Book Puzzle

A Strange Death

By: Hillel Halkin

A gripping tale of betrayal and deception in a hilltop village in 1917 Palestine. Hillel Halkin investigates the fate of an anti-Ottoman spy ring during the First World War and of the people alleged to have betrayed them.

Average ratings

N/A

Write a review

Solve jigsaw puzzle

Age

Page Count

388

Published Date

ISBN 10

0297850954

ISBN 13

9780297850953

Jabotinsky

A Life

By: Hillel Halkin

Write a review Read reviews Take a Quiz Solve Book Puzzle

Jabotinsky

A Life

By: Hillel Halkin

Vladimir Jabotinsky (1880-1940) was a man of huge paradoxes and contradictions and is one of the most misunderstood Zionist political leaders - a first-rate novelist, a celebrated Russian journalist, and founder of the branch of Zionism now headed by Benjamin Netanyahu. This biography, the first in English in more than two decades, undertakes to answer central questions about Jabotinsky as a man, a political thinker, and a leader. Hillel Halkin sets aside the stereotypes Jabotinsky has been reduced to, and reveals the public figure and private man who inspired both deep devotion and furious protest.

Average ratings

N/A

Write a review

Solve jigsaw puzzle

Age

Page Count

256

Publisher

Yale University Press

Published Date

ISBN 10

0300136625

ISBN 13

9780300136623

After One-Hundred-and-Twenty

Reflecting on Death, Mourning, and the Afterlife in the Jewish Tradition

By: Hillel Halkin

Write a review Read reviews Take a Quiz Solve Book Puzzle

After One-Hundred-and-Twenty

Reflecting on Death, Mourning, and the Afterlife in the Jewish Tradition

By: Hillel Halkin

Average ratings

N/A

Write a review

Solve jigsaw puzzle

Age

Page Count

233

Publisher

Princeton University Press

Published Date

ISBN 10

1400880467

ISBN 13

9781400880461

Yehuda Halevi

By: Hillel Halkin

Write a review Read reviews Take a Quiz Solve Book Puzzle

Yehuda Halevi

By: Hillel Halkin

Average ratings

N/A

Write a review

Solve jigsaw puzzle

Age

Page Count

369

Publisher

Jewish Encounters

Published Date

ISBN 10

0805242066

ISBN 13

9780805242065

Luck and Chutzpah

Against All Odds

By: Hans G. Kahn,Hillel Halkin

Write a review Read reviews Take a Quiz Solve Book Puzzle

Luck and Chutzpah

Against All Odds

By: Hans G. Kahn,Hillel Halkin

The story takes us up to the present day.

Average ratings

N/A

Write a review

Solve jigsaw puzzle

Age

Page Count

288

Publisher

Gefen Publishing House Ltd

Published Date

ISBN 10

9652291595

ISBN 13

9789652291592

A Complicated Jew

Selected Essays

By: Hillel Halkin

Write a review Read reviews Take a Quiz Solve Book Puzzle

A Complicated Jew

Selected Essays

By: Hillel Halkin

Average ratings

N/A

Write a review

Solve jigsaw puzzle

Age

Page Count

302

Publisher

Wicked Son

Published Date

ISBN 10

1642938114

ISBN 13

9781642938111

Feathers

By: Haim Be'er

Write a review Read reviews Take a Quiz Solve Book Puzzle

Feathers

By: Haim Be'er

A classic of modern Israeli literature in English for the first time.

Average ratings

N/A

Write a review

Solve jigsaw puzzle

Age

Page Count

253

Publisher

UPNE

Published Date

ISBN 10

1584655356

ISBN 13

9781584655350

Jabotinsky

A Life

By: Hillel Halkin

Write a review Read reviews Take a Quiz Solve Book Puzzle

Jabotinsky

A Life

By: Hillel Halkin

Vladimir Jabotinsky (1880–1940) was a man of huge paradoxes and contradictions and has been the most misunderstood of all Zionist politicians--a first-rate novelist, a celebrated Russian journalist, and the founder of the branch of Zionism now headed by Benjamin Netanyahu. This biography, the first in English in nearly two decades, undertakes to answer central questions about Jabotinsky as a writer, a political thinker, and a leader. Hillel Halkin sets aside the stereotypes to which Jabotinsky has been reduced by his would-be followers and detractors alike. Halkin explains the importance of Odessa, Jabotinsky’s native city, in molding his character and outlook; discusses his novels and short stories, showing the sometimes hidden connections between them and Jabotinsky’s political thought, and studies a political career that ended in tragic failure. Halkin also addresses Jabotinsky’s position, unique among the great figures of Zionist history, as both a territorial maximalist and a principled believer in democracy. The author inquires why Jabotinsky was often accused of fascist tendencies though he abhorred authoritarian and totalitarian politics, and investigates the many opposed aspects of his personality and conduct while asking whether or not they had an ultimate coherence. Few figures in twentieth-century Jewish life were quite so admired and loathed, and Halkin’s splendid, subtle book explores him with empathy and lucidity.

Average ratings

N/A

Write a review

Solve jigsaw puzzle

Age

Page Count

256

Publisher

Yale University Press

Published Date

ISBN 10

0300210019

ISBN 13

9780300210019

Luck and Chutzpah

Against All Odds

By: Hans G. Kahn,Hillel Halkin

Write a review Read reviews Take a Quiz Solve Book Puzzle

Luck and Chutzpah

Against All Odds

By: Hans G. Kahn,Hillel Halkin

The story takes us up to the present day.

Average ratings

N/A

Write a review

Solve jigsaw puzzle

Age

Page Count

288

Publisher

Gefen Publishing House Ltd

Published Date

ISBN 10

9652291595

ISBN 13

9789652291592

The Lives of the Children of Manasia: Oral History Interviews with the B'Nei Menashe Community in Israel

By: Hillel Halkin,Isaac Thangjom

Write a review Read reviews Take a Quiz Solve Book Puzzle

The Lives of the Children of Manasia: Oral History Interviews with the B'Nei Menashe Community in Israel

By: Hillel Halkin,Isaac Thangjom

The Kuki-Mizo are a Tibeto-Burman ethnic group living in the northeast Indian states of Manipur and Mizoram, in the remote foothills of the Himalayas along the Burmese border, and the Judaizing movement that led to the formation of the B'nei Menashe started in their midst in the early 1970s. Many of the men and women interviewed in Lives of the Children of Manasia were among the founders of this movement. Their individual life stories, each fascinating in its way and some telling of experiences that our modern minds find difficult to grasp, narrate a collective drama that until now has been shrouded in myth and misconceptions. These stories explain how an initially small of number of people, whose immediate ancestors were illiterate rice farmers, jungle warriors, and practitioners of a traditional tribal religion, courageously found their way to Judaism; what about the latter attracted them though they had never before met a rel Jew in their lives; and how their fierce attachment to their new faith eventually brought them and thousands of others to Israel, where some 5,000 of them live today as full citizens.

Average ratings

N/A

Write a review

Solve jigsaw puzzle

Age

Page Count

376

Publisher

Gefen Books

Published Date

ISBN 10

9657023912

ISBN 13

9789657023914

Book's by Hillel Halkin

A Complicated Jew

A Complicated Jew

After One-Hundred-and-Twenty

After One-Hundred-and-Twenty

Yehuda Halevi

Yehuda Halevi

A Strange Death

A Strange Death

Jabotinsky

Jabotinsky

After One-Hundred-and-Twenty

After One-Hundred-and-Twenty

Yehuda Halevi

Yehuda Halevi

Luck and Chutzpah

Luck and Chutzpah

A Complicated Jew

A Complicated Jew

Feathers

Feathers

Jabotinsky

Jabotinsky

Luck and Chutzpah

Luck and Chutzpah

The Lives of the Children of Manasia: Oral History Interviews with the B'Nei Menashe Community in Israel

The Lives of the Children of Manasia: Oral History Interviews with the B'Nei Menashe Community in Israel

Username

Password

Username

Password

Password again

Birthday

Email