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A portrait of Europe as you've never seen it before, told through twenty extraordinary stories of the people who live and breathe it. What does it now mean to call yourself European? Who makes up this population of 750 million, sprawled from Portugal to Ukraine, from Sweden to Turkey? Who has always called it home, and who has newly arrived from elsewhere, hoping for better? Who are the people who drive our long-distance lorries, steward our criss-crossing planes, craft our legacy wines, fish our depleted waters, and risk life itself in search of safety and a new start? In a series of vivid, ambitious, sometimes darkly funny, often painfully visceral portraits of other people's lives, Ben Judah invites us to meet them. As they tell their important stories, they reveal a frenetic and vibrant continent transformed by complex supply chains, by migration, Islam, ideologies, the internet, by climate change, COVID, and war. Laid dramatically bare, it may not always be a Europe we recognize - but this is Europe.

This is London in the eyes of its beggars, bankers, coppers, gangsters, carers, witch-doctors and sex workers. This is London in the voices of Arabs, Afghans, Nigerians, Poles, Romanians and Russians. This is London as you've never seen it before. Longlisted for the Baillie Gifford Prize for Non-fiction 2016 Shortlisted for the Ryszard Kapuscinski Award for Literary Reportage 2019 'An eye-opening investigation into the hidden immigrant life of the city' Sunday Times 'Full of nuggets of unexpected information about the lives of others . . . It recalls the journalism of Orwell' Financial Times 'Ben Judah grabs hold of London and shakes out its secrets' The Economist

This issue of The Jewish Quarterly explores the remarkable evolution and revival of Hebrew - a language whose trajectory charts the recent history of the Jewish people. In this ground-breaking essay, award-winning writer Ben Judah explores the crucial role of modern Hebrew in defining and reshaping the Jewish people and examines its status as a fast-changing language that is spoken by Jews and Palestinians. He describes his experience of longing for and learning the language, and argues that Hebrew is a missing connection between Israel and the Diaspora. The issue also includes a short story by Isaac Bashevis Singer that has been translated into English for the first time, an essay by Marta Figlerowicz about the Polish writer and artist Bruno Schulz, and more.

Judah ben Joseph Moscato was one of the most distinguished rabbis, authors and preachers of the Italian-Jewish Renaissance.

Judah ben Joseph Moscato (c.1533–1590) was one of the most distinguished rabbis, authors, and preachers of the Italian-Jewish Renaissance. The book Sefer Nefu?ot Yehudah belongs to the very centre of his homiletic and philosophical oeuvre.

“A beautifully written and very lively study of Russia that argues that the political order created by Vladimir Putin is stagnating” (Financial Times). From Kaliningrad on the Baltic to the Russian Far East, journalist Ben Judah has traveled throughout Russia and the former Soviet republics, conducting extensive interviews with President Vladimir Putin’s friends, foes, and colleagues, government officials, business tycoons, mobsters, and ordinary Russian citizens. Fragile Empire is the fruit of Judah’s thorough research: A probing assessment of Putin’s rise to power and what it has meant for Russia and her people. Despite a propaganda program intent on maintaining the cliché of stability, Putin’s regime was suddenly confronted in December 2011 by a highly public protest movement that told a different side of the story. Judah argues that Putinism has brought economic growth to Russia but also weaker institutions, and this contradiction leads to instability. The author explores both Putin’s successes and his failed promises, taking into account the impact of a new middle class and a new generation, the Internet, social activism, and globalization on the president’s impending leadership crisis. Can Russia avoid the crisis of Putinism? Judah offers original and up-to-the-minute answers. “[A] dynamic account of the rise (and fall-in-progress) of Russian President Vladimir Putin.” —Publishers Weekly “[Judah] shuttles to and fro across Russia’s vast terrain, finding criminals, liars, fascists and crooked politicians, as well as the occasional saintly figure.” —The Economist “His lively account of his remote adventures forms the most enjoyable part of Fragile Empire, and puts me in mind of Chekhov’s famous 1890 journey to Sakhalin Island.” —The Guardian

The Sabbath has been one of the most significant and beloved institutions of Jewish life since late antiquity. Over a period of several centuries, the classical Kabbalists developed a rich body of ritual and myth that articulated a fresh vision of the Sabbath. The mystical understanding of the Sabbath was assimilated by virtually every Jewish community. This volume is a translation and critical commentary to Sod ha-Shabbat, a treatise on the mystical Sabbath by the influential Spanish-Turkish Kabbalist, R. Meir ibn Gabbai. This important text, the most systematic treatment of the Sabbath in classical Kabbalah, has been inaccessible to the English reader until now. The study includes an Introduction to ibn Gabbai's life and work, accompanied by extensive critical notes that clarify general problems of translation and place the work in its historical context. Broader theoretical issues regarding myth and the ritual process are also discussed.