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GLIMPSES OF SOUTHERN JEWISH ROOTS
A collection of original short stories about real people and actual events involving Jews who arrived in the South in the early part of the last century. We see glimpses of what life was like for them in the New World. The stories are rich with the customs, attitudes and struggles of these newcomers and the ways they created to adapt to America. A piece of living Jewish history can be seen in the humorous and moving tales of the people who helped make it. Here are the new immigrants interacting with their new country and with each other.

CALL HER BLESSED:
Lara Moskovitz Berkovitz wrote her story in her own unique voice and language. It reveals how a shy uncertain girl, through struggles, hardships and great losses, became an extraordinary woman. Her moving memoir is embedded in a narrative by her daughter giving the history, background and setting of her life. The events of the early 20th century played out powerfully against the lives of Lara and her newly southern American Jewish family.
At the end Lara wrote:
"You get what you Build. That's my Life."
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WORKS:
CREATIVE NON-FICTION




Lara Moskovitz at 14 1/2

Here is a quote from the narrative text of CALL HER BLESSED:

Used to a life of comfort, after her marriage to Yankel Moskovitz, Gittel Nachman was soon measuring the amount of water to add to the soup pot mouth by mouth. At first she added a cup for Itzick, their first born, then a second for Julius and a third for Shruel. By the time Lara, her younger sister Sophica, and Ruben came along, the cups to be added called for a cauldron.

BURNT OFFERINGS -- based on material from CALL HER BLESSED. An old man, widowed after 59 years of a happy marriage and now awaiting death, recalls his life and the terrible mistakes he made with those he loved most.

ROSA BELLA TAKES CARE OF THE WORLD
Based on a true story set in America's South and Havana, Cuba at the beginning of the 20th century which deals with an Eastern European Jewish tradition of "special women."



YANKEL IN AMERICA
Reading at The Lambs Club December 2005
Based on material from GLIMPSES OF SOUTHERN JEWISH ROOTS AND CALL HER BLESSED

MARIE THERESE
Marie Therese (Die Marschallin) has not seen her younger lover, Octavian, nor his young wife, Sophie, since she sent him away 10 years earlier fearing he would eventually leave her. She was 31, Octavian and Sophie were both 17. When they reunite, his unquenched love for her tempts her to resume her affair with him, but memory is overwhelmed by new and wholly unsuspected feelings.

THE TORTOISE AND THE YARROW -- A SPECTACLE PLAY WIIH MUSIC SET IN BRONZE-AGE CHINA --Confucius narrates the conflict between the SHANG and the CHOU dynasties in ancient China leading to the I CHING. As he studies the history, the events he describes come to life on the stage.