Early 20th Century

On February 18 1912, a Prague businessman and little-known German-language writer named Franz Kafka introduced an evening of Yiddish literary recitations in the city’s Jewish Town Hall.

History belonged to the opera writers. First Goldfaden, and later Hurwitz and Lateiner and their followers, owned the franchise on Jewish history.

Adapting to the abundance of the New World, Passover developed into a secular festival for shopping and entertainment.

. Why would it be a problem if someone went to a music hall simply to have some fun? In the early 1900s, the answer was complicated.

In 1912, a Jewish tailor left Imperial Russia for Denmark.

“My Uncle Ed was a Yiddish theatre impresario,” my friend Martha mentioned casually, as we were busy prepping for an event at our local Yiddish organization.