“Beth Kissileff, the Pittsburgh-based editor of Reading Genesis: Beginnings, is a writer and journalist who teaches Hebrew Bible, Jewish Studies and literature at various colleges. As explained in the introduction, even as a child the stories in Genesis bothered her until she later attended a lecture by Avivah Gottlieb Zornberg in Jerusalem. Ms. Zornberg analyzed the text of Exodus 38:8 (on women’s mirrors contributing to the building of the tabernacle in the wilderness) with reference to Milan Kundera’s novel The Unbearable Lightness of Being: ‘Zornberg taught me that literature, psychoanalysis and literary theory can illuminate the biblical text. When she brought in Yeats or Blake or a line from George Eliot, it resonated with the biblical text and gave the ancient words startling new ramifications and connections…'”
Read More in the Post-Gazette…
“In the beginning, the book was launched.
On Thursday, Feb. 11, local author Beth Kissileff hosted an event at the Jewish Community Center in Squirrel Hill marking the release of her anthology, Reading Genesis: Beginnings. The program welcomed 30 community members for a panel discussion, questions with contributors and light refreshments.
‘Why aren’t people more interested in the Bible,’ Kissileff rhetorically remarked at the beginning of the program. ‘There’s a problem with getting contemporary Jews to believe the text is accessible…'”
Read more in The Jewish Chronicle…
Piece on Reading Genesis ….Bible spotlighted as local author hosts book launch.https://t.co/j5KX10yC3w @tandtclark @BloomsburyBooks
— Beth Kissileff (@bethkissileff) February 17, 2016
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