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Or: Are You up for this Plan?

During the week of 21 to 27 October 2013, the Academy of the Jewish Museum Berlin, in cooperation with Kulturkind e.V., will host readings, workshops, and an open day for the public with the theme “Multifaceted: a book week on diversity in children’s and young adult literature.” Employees of various departments have been vigorously reading, discussing, and preparing a selection of books for the occasion. Some of these books have already been introduced here over the course of the last weeks.

“Meshugge” is one of the words Ace uses to comment on stuff in the children’s novel When Life Gives You O.J. Ace is the extraordinary grandpa of Zelda Fried aka Zelly, Zellybelly, Zeldale, or Zelly-bean. Grandpa has a plan that Zelly finds completely meschugge, as well as downright dumb. But what on earth is a girl to do? She has told her grandpa she is up for the scheme, and Ace would never understand if she were to back out now, or if she failed to muster the chutzpah* to see the thing through. And in any case, there’s still a chance grandpa’s plan may succeed. In which case Zelly’s dearest dream would finally come true—perhaps even before her eleventh birthday! → continue reading

Employees of the Jewish Museum Berlin respond:

“When I think back, I remember first of all friends and family, followed by food – a whole lot of food.” Roland Schmidt, Host

“I remember the meals at my grandmother’s as so sumptuous and sprawling that I had the feeling I needed to fast not just on Yom Kippur but for the whole rest of the year.” Alina Gromova, Academic Employee in the Fellowship Program, and Guide

© Alina Gromova, Jewish Museum Berlin

“To stay on the culinary topic, I can bring up the days when gefilte fish was still cooked at home. You would order two carp at the fishmonger – who was doing enough business in September to last the entire year, because the customers celebrating Rosh ha-Shanah would stand in line for live fish. You would carry home the floundering content in a metal bucket on the tram, accompanied by the cold glares of ditrustful animal rights activists sitting near you. → continue reading

During the week of October 21 to 27, 2013 the Academy of the Jewish Museum Berlin, in cooperation with Kulturkind e.V., will host readings, workshops, and an open day for the public with the theme “Multifaceted: a book week on diversity in children’s and young adult literature.” Employees of various departments have been vigorously reading, discussing, and preparing a selection of books for the occasion. Some of these books will be introduced here over the course of the next few months. In order to be able to recommend books, we had to choose a focus and select appropriate books. It was clear from the start that finding good books about migration and coexistence was important to us. And we also considered the meaning of religion as a topic. Interestingly, everyone in our reading group agreed that we should include books with Islamic themes as well as Jewish ones. At the beginning, we hesitated as to whether to add books about Christianity, but ultimately decided to select narrative children’s and young adult books that represent all three religions. And we hope to be able to recommend a number of them.

It was in this context that I came across the book, Wo bitte geht’s zu Gott?, fragte das kleine Ferkel (Which is the Way to God, Please? Little Piglet Asked) by Michael Schmidt-Salomon with pictures by Helge Nyncke. → continue reading