Recent Publications

Regine Rosenthal (Faculty) - Exclusion, Exile, and The Wandering Jew In Jewish Literature (2024) 

Based on a medieval extrabiblical Christian legend, the figure of the Wandering Jew has long served as a negative representation of all Jews. Condemned by Christ to endless wandering and everlasting life, the Wandering Jew has lived on ever since in literature and criticism as a legendary and symbolic paradigm, ranging from anti-Jewish stereotype to the generalized cultural Other. While Romanticism took him outside of the Jewish context, nineteenth-century antisemitic racism again adopted the figure in an evolving discourse that culminated in his image in Nazi propaganda as the despicable, racialized cultural Other who needed to be exterminated. The present work takes up this trope in all its complex, intersecting facets and shifts the focus of the inquiry from the perspective of the dominant culture to that of the Jewish Other. Starting with nineteenth-century American popular and mainstream writers, it explores the responses to, and the subversions and reinventions of, the paradigmatic figure in works by a variety of European, Canadian, and American Jewish writers and thinkers. It also opens the discussion to the broader issues of contemporary society and politics, such as pervasive uprootedness, transborder migration, the plight of refugees, and states' rights versus human rights.

 

Tom Zoellner (Faculty/Alumnus) - Island on Fire: The Revolt That Ended Slavery in the British Empire (2022)  

The final uprising of enslaved people in Jamaica started as a peaceful labor strike a few days shy of Christmas in 1831. A harsh crackdown by white militias quickly sparked a full-blown revolt, leaving hundreds of plantation houses in smoking ruins. The rebels lost their daring bid for freedom, but their headline-grabbing defiance triggered a decisive turn against slavery.

Island on Fire 
is a dramatic day-by-day account of these transformative events. A skillful storyteller, Tom Zoellner uses diaries, letters, and colonial records to tell the intimate story of the men and women who rose up and briefly tasted liberty. He brings to life the rebellion's enigmatic leader, the preacher Samuel Sharpe, and shows how his fiery resistance turned the tide of opinion in London and hastened the end of slavery in the British Empire.

 

Saul Lelchuk (Faculty) - One Got Away (A Novel) (2021) 

The reclusive matriarch of one of San Francisco's wealthiest and most private families has been defrauded by a con-man, and her furious son enlists Nikki to find the money. And find the con-man, Dr. Geoffrey Coombs.

Nikki isn't a fan of men who hurt people. Quietly running her used bookstore by day, her secret mission, born of revenge and trauma, is to do everything she can to remove the innocent from dangerous situations―and punish the men responsible.

It seemed like a simple job, but as Coombs leads Nikki on a trail littered with deceptions, she realizes that he's not the only one lying: no one involved is telling her the truth.

As Nikki draws closer to Coombs and learns more about who he really is, she is taken aback to realize that she is starting to enjoy the chase―and that the two of them might share more in common than she would like to admit.

But while she closes in on Coombs, others are looking for him, too. As Nikki glimpses secrets that powerful people want to remain hidden, she begins to suspect that lives are in peril.

From breathtaking cliffside resorts to the shady underworld of stolen cars, from drug-filled trailers to the city's loftiest penthouses, Nikki slowly uncovers the deep rot at the center of the case. She is forced to make terrible choices about who to help―and how to keep herself alive.

If she can fit the pieces together in time, she just might be able to save them all.

 

Teresa Lust (Alumna)  - A Blissful Feast: Culinary Adventures in Italy's Piedmont, Maremma, and Le Marche (2020) 

Moving from the Italian Piedmont to the Maremma and then to Le Marche, chef Teresa Lust interweaves portraits of the people who served as her culinary guides with cultural and natural history in this charming exploration of authentic Italian cuisine.

We learn how to prepare bagna cauda―a robust dipping sauce of anchovies, garlic, and olive oil―with Lust's relatives outside Torino. We learn about making hand-stretched grissini, Italy's iconic breadstick, the secrets of whipping up zabaione, a classic dessert of ethereal foam made with egg yolks, sugar, and marsala. Then there is acquacotta, a rustic soup that nourished generations of the area's shepherds and cowhands. In the town of Camerano, an eighty-year-old woman reveals the art of hand-rolling pasta with a three-foot rolling pin.

Underpinning Lust's travels is our journey from chef to cook, mirroring the fact that Italians have been masters of home cooking for generations, so they are an obvious source of inspiration. Today, more and more people are rediscovering the pleasures of cooking at home, and Lust's account―and wonderful recipes―will help readers bring an Italian sensibility to their home tables.