You Know the Name, Come Meet the Man

Rabbi. Maverick. Gadfly. Theologian. Heretic. Teacher. Writer. Critic. Communal servant. Proud papa. Doting grandfather. A loving husband (twice over).

For the very first time, a biography that takes the full measure of Mordechai Kaplan, this towering American Jewish personality, has been published. It’s the work of Jenna Weissman Joselit, the celebrated cultural historian and public intellectual, whose eye for the intimate, unvarnished details of American Jewish life is without peer. Her absorbing and moving narrative trains its sights not only on Kaplan’s singular accomplishments but also on the crushing upsets and personal disappointments that laid him low, time and again.

Listen in as JWJ talks about the challenges of reconciling this colossus of public Jewish life with the doubting Thomas of his private study; of how it felt to eavesdrop on over 70 years of Kaplan’s searing journal entries; and of where to draw a line between genuine revelation and juicy gossip as the New York Jewish Week and UJA-Federation of New York welcomes you to the next event in our Folio literary series. Jenna will be joined in conversation with Andrew Silow-Carroll, New York Jewish Week, editor at large.

Jenna Weissman Joselit, the Charles E. Smith Professor of Judaic Studies & Professor of History at the George Washington University, is the author of seven books, among them the award-winning The Wonders of America:  Reinventing Jewish Culture. You may also know her through the hundreds of articles about American Jewish history and culture that she’s published over the past 25 years – and counting – as a monthly columnist for the Forward and Tablet and a contributing writer for the Jewish Review of Books. Her work has also appeared in the New York Times, the New Republic, Gastronomica and in many scholarly journals.