Trudy Gold
Israel Zangwill, the ‘Jewish Dickens’ and the Kilburn Wanderers, Part 1
Summary
Hailed as the ‘Jewish Dickens’, Zangwill was a prolific author, Zionist and later a territorialist. In London, he was at the centre of a group of Jewish intellectuals that included Solomon Schechter, Asher Myers and Moses Gaster. Their impact on the Jewish future, both in terms of Zionism, territorialism, acculturation and religiosity was profound. This is their story. Part 1 of 2, this presentation will focus on his biography and that of his circle.
Trudy Gold
Trudy Gold was the CEO of the London Jewish Cultural Centre and a founding member of the British delegation to the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA). Throughout her career she taught modern Jewish history at schools, universities, and to adult groups and ran seminars on Holocaust education in the UK, Eastern Europe, and China. She also led Jewish educational tours all over the world. Trudy was the educational director of the student resources “Understanding the Holocaust” and “Holocaust Explained” and the author of The Timechart History of Jewish Civilization.
Yes, you can get them.
Yes, Myrna, I think we can go with that.
Well, I don’t know that they did have such an influence in the Jewish world. What happened to most of the Kilburn Wanderers is they went to America. The problem with Anglo Jewry is, oh God, I think one of the problems is they tried so hard to be English gentlemen. And the majority of those, the wealthy, their children intermarried into the aristocracy. Today we have a huge responsibility because the great diaspora communities are over. Come on, if you think about what happened in the Shoah, the largest community in Europe was of course Poland. And it’s over. So France is the largest community in Europe, but the majority of French Jews are Jews from Algeria and Morocco. The majority of the indigenous French population of the majority of the Ashkenazi Jewish population, they’re very much the minority now in France, Anglo Jewry. But Anglo Jewry still can’t make up its mind if it’s in British or Jewish. It’s very complex.