Solti On Solti: A Memoir

"Gene Gutowski's name is associated with some of the great films of the twentieth century: the Oscar-winning masterpiece The Pianist, Repulsion, Cul-de-sac, and Fearless Vampire Killers. Producer of many of Roman Polanski's classics, Gene Gutowski shares here his extraordinary memoirs: those of a Polish Jew, alone in occupied Warsaw after the deportation of his entire family. As a young man who, with the blind courage of one who has nothing to lose, took incredible risks, he narrowly escaped the many horrors of life in Nazi-occupied Poland. In an extraordinary twist of destiny, and thanks to his prodigious resourcefulness, Gene Gutowski found himself in Germany in 1945, working as an American counter-espionage agent. After the war, he made his way to New York, where he worked as a fashion illustrator and TV producer, then on to London, where he became a successful producer and member of the jet set during the sixties. Finally, he achieved Hollywood consecration with the three Oscars won by The Pianist. It is an extremely endearing personality that reveals itself here, modest about the difficulties overcome, honest about the successes and failures. Gene Gutowski's youth was a thumb of the nose to death and totalitarianism, and his journey is a formidable life lesson"--back cover.

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"Frank Blaichman was sixteen years old when German forces invaded Poland. He saw his friends and neighbors conscripted to work as slave laborers. His uncle was taken outside his home and shot for preparing kosher meat; a few weeks later, one of his cousins was shot in her bed. When the roundups and deportations came, Blaichman knew he would not go quietly." "He set off for a nearby forest to find the underground bunkers of Jews who had already escaped. Together they formed a Jewish partisan force dedicated to fighting the Germans and anyone who collaborated with them, while hiding and sheltering those who were unable to take up arms. Death stalked the lives of these brave soldiers without an army - but they knew they would rather die fighting than surrender. As their numbers grew, they took up arms alongside Polish partisan units, and in 1944, they faced their greatest test: well-armed and well-rested German army battalions and air force units sent to destroy them." "Rather Die Fighting is the inspirational memoir of a man who dared to stand up to the Nazis against all odds. It is a saga of courage, sacrifice, and honor - and a fitting tribute to those who fought shoulder to shoulder to protect their families and homeland in World War II." --Book Jacket.

The Education of Fanny Lewald is the autobiography of the most popular and prolific German woman writer of her period (1811-1889). The author of more than fifty books of fiction, travel memoirs, and articles about current events, Lewald was a friend or acquaintance of many of the prominent intellectual, artistic, and political figures of nineteenth-century Europe. Her autobiography is clearly and engagingly written. We see her developing from the bright, oldest child of a middle-class Jewish family in East Prussia into a successful writer and financially independent woman. And we see her struggles with a patriarchal society along the way.

"Evelyn Fox Keller trained as a theoretical physicist at a time when women didn't "do physics." Unable to find a supportive advisor, she moved into the new field of molecular biology just getting off the ground. After receiving her doctorate, she returned to physics but then took another swerve, joining a small interdisciplinary effort to develop mathematical models of biological systems. This work led to her appointment to a special position as Professor of Mathematics and Humanities at Northeastern University. When second-wave feminism arrived in the 1960s, it changed the lives of everyone in its path. It certainly changed Keller's, leading her beyond the borders of science altogether. Eventually she began to think of herself as a dual citizen of the proverbial two cultures―science and humanities. The trajectory was hardly straightforward, nor was it conducive to building a conventional career, or even getting a job. Now in hindsight, after an illustrious career and having published fourteen books, Keller reflects on her life, influences, successes and struggles along her trailblazing path as a scientist and feminist." -- From publisher's website

Elmer Gertz has defended famous people--including Henry Miller, Nathan Leopold, and Jack Ruby--and he has become famous in his own right through his struggle for civil liberties and personal rights. Gertz has taken on a lengthy list of cases and causes over the six decades of his legal career. He fought successfully against the censorship of Henry Miller's book Tropic of Cancer , which had been banned in Chicago for obscenity. He got Nathan Leopold released from prison after Leopold had served 34 years for his part in the death of 14-year-old Bobby Franks. An ardent foe of the death penalty, Gertz labored for years as part of a national team of lawyers that was finally able to overturn Jack Ruby's death sentence for the murder of Lee Harvey Oswald. Gertz's cases have helped make libel law in the nation. For this edition, Gertz adds an afterword that covers the 15 years since the book's first publication. Gertz talks of Henry Miller's last days and his travels to the USSR on behalf of the Refuseniks.

Before Elliot found financial success by bringing Woodstock Ventures to his motel, he was one of Manhattan’s leading interior designers. Then Elliot’s career came to a halt due to a floating society party, Judy Garland and the Mob.In April 1968, Elliot was hired to throw an elegant dinner party aboard a luxury yacht on the Hudson River. Included on the guest list were New York’s rich and famous--p[Bokinfo]

Rabbi Moses Hagiz, one of the most prominent and influential Jewish leaders of seventeenth-century Amsterdam, devoted his career to restoring rabbinic authority. His most prominent talent was as a polemicist, and he campaigned ceaselessly against Jewish heresy in an attempt to unify the rabbinate. During Hagiz's lifetime there was an overall decline in rabbinic authority, which the author argues was the result of migration and assimilation. Elisheva Carlebach focuses on three of the most important episodes in Hagiz's organized campaigns against heresy: the Haylon controversy in Amsterdam, 1713-1715; a campaign against Sabbatian emissaries in 1725-1726; and the Luzzato controversy of 1730-1736. Each episode, Carlebach argues, illuminates the struggle for control of the Jewish community between rabbinate and lay leaders.

Traces the life of the Russian poet, describes the background of her times, and attempts to portray her complex personality

"Traces the three major periods of Begin's life and the events and influences in each that formed his personality, ideology, and opinions: his early years in Poland as a leader in the right-wing youth movement Betar, and later, during World War II, his years in a Soviet prison camp; his years during the 1940s when, as head of the underground, he directed attacks against the British while in hiding; and, since the founding of the state of Israel, his years in political life as leader of the opposition." -- Dust jacket.

"It's a long way from a large, luxurious rambling estate in the Connecticut country side to 77 Sunset Strip, but Efrem Zimbalist, Jr. made that journey, traveling many different roads, during the life he so engagingly recreates in this memoir. His parents, Alma Gluck and Efrem Zimbalist, acclaimed for their artistry throughout the world, provided their son with a childhood of comfort and security - and, of course, music."

In the late 1980s, when she began keeping a diary, Edwina Currie was the second most prominent woman in British politics - after Margaret Thatcher. Indeed, she was often spoken of as a potential Prime Minister. Her outspokenness and her lively, media-friendly personality won her a much higher profile than her status as a junior minister would otherwise have commanded. When she was forced to resign from the Government after warning of the danger signs of salmonella infection in eggs, she was already a national figure. The appearance of these diaries is an important publishing event. Like Alan Clark's diaries, they provide a remarkable insight into politics at the top, by a writer with an observant eye and a sharp sense of humour. Edwina Currie's honesty, her frankness and her courage make these unexpurgated diaries an irresistible read. Their revelation of her four-year affair with former Prime Minister John Major has already been a media sensation.

In these vivid portraits of prominent twentieth-century intellectuals, Edward Shils couples the sensitivity of a biographer with the profound knowledge of a highly respected scholar. Ranging as widely across various disciplines as Shils himself did, the essays gathered here share a distaste for faddists who "run with the intellectual mob" and a deep respect for intellectuals who maintain their integrity under great pressure. Highlights include an affectionate treatment of Leo Szilard, the physicist whose involvement with the development of the atomic bomb led him to work ceaselessly to address its social consequences; a discussion of the educational philosophy of Robert Maynard Hutchins, the University of Chicago's fifth and most controversial president; an appreciative account of the Polish emigre Leopold Labedz's well-informed and outspoken resistance to Communism; and an essay about the extraordinary Indian writer Nirad Chaudhuri.

A compilation of Midrash, Biblical, and legendary stories about the prophet Moses, who led the Children of Israel out of slavery in Egypt.

One of England’s foremost filmmakers, Derek Jarman (1942–1994) wrote and directed several feature films, including Sebastiane, Jubilee, Caravaggio, and Blue, as well as numerous short films and music videos. He was a stage designer, artist, writer, gardener, and an outspoken AIDS and queer rights activist in the UK and the United States. He is the author of several books, among them Modern Nature, available from the University of Minnesota Press.

The compelling autobiography of Israel's preeminent photojournalist, illustrated with his most memorable images. Today, photojournalist David Rubinger stands at the peak of his profession: a winner of the Israel Prize for services to the media and a fixture on the masthead of Time, he is the only photographer whose work is on permanent display at the Knesset, Israel’s legislature. In this fascinating volume, he reports his own story, which in many ways reflects the history of Israel that he has recorded so faithfully with his camera. Born in Vienna in 1924, he emigrated to British Palestine in 1939 and developed a passion for photography while serving in the British army’s Jewish Brigade. After fighting in Israel’s War of Independence, he became a professional news photographer, reporting on each of his young nation’s subsequent wars from the front lines, at first for the Israeli media and later as a correspondent for Time-Life. He photographed all of Israel’s leaders, many of whom have allowed him a remarkable degree of access to their lives; Ariel Sharon said, “I trust Rubinger even though I know he doesn’t vote for me.” But Rubinger has not confined his reporting to war and politics; by photographing the successive waves of Jewish immigrants from Europe, the Arab world, Russia, and Ethiopia, he has also created a valuable record of Israel’s transformation from a country of six hundred thousand to one of seven million. In recounting his eventful career, Rubinger proves himself a gifted raconteur, sharing anecdotes of the many leading personalities he has photographed and telling the stories behind his most famous pictures, many of which are reproduced here at full-page size. Also illustrated are a selection of Rubinger’s never-before-published personal photographs, which provide vivid behind-the-scenes glimpses into the fast-paced and sometimes daring work of a photojournalist. Both a personal account of one man’s life with the camera and a visual document of the birth of a nation, Israel through My Lens is an essential book for anyone with an interest in Israeli history or the art of photojournalism.

On the surface, David Baddiel's childhood was fairly standard: a lower-middle-class Jewish family living in an ordinary house in Dollis Hill, north-west London. But David came to realise that his mother was in fact not ordinary at all. Having escaped extermination by fleeing Nazi Germany as a child, she was desperate to make her life count, which took the form of a passionate, decades-long affair with a golfing memorabilia salesman. Meanwhile, as Baddiel investigates his family's past, his father's memories are fading; dementia is making him moodier and more disinhibited, with an even greater penchant for obscenity. As with his mother's affair, there is both comedy and poignancy to be found: laughter is a constant presence, capable of transforming the darkest of experiences into something redemptive.