To Be a King for One Night: Night Studies, Jewish Studies, Eastern European Studies
Ofer Dynes
Columbia University10.7.2023, 18:30
Conference Room of the Center for Urban History
Around 1902, a Jewish girl in a public school in Lviv protested upon being punished: "You have no right! One of my forefathers was the King of Poland!" This event was the departure point of a historical investigation into the legend about Saul Wahl, a Jewish merchant who was imagined to be the King of Poland for one night.
We are pleased to invite you to the lecture by Ofer Dynes, which will be based on this event and the legend itself. From this departure point, the lecture talk will go into three different directions, investigating the fantasy of being King for one night and the meaning of looking for evidence of Jewish political power in the archives. Finally, what the legend and its social life tell us about the intersection of Jewish, Eastern European History, and Night Studies.
A historian will moderate the event and the Center's researcher Dr. Vladyslava Moskalets.
The meeting will take place in the conference hall of the Center for Urban History.
Working language: English (simultaneous translation into Ukrainian is provided).
Ofer Dynes
Columbia UniversityLeonard Kaye Assistant Professor of Hebrew and Comparative Literature at the Columbia University. He specializes in the literature and cultural history of Eastern European Jewry from the 18th to 21st centuries. He has a particular interest in the nexus of literature and political thought. He is currently completing a book manuscript entitled The Fiction of the State: The Polish Partitions and the Beginning of Modern Jewish Literature (1772–1848). He has also recently co-edited a special volume of Prooftexts, entitled The Beginnings of Modern Jewish Literature in Europe, with Naomi Seidman (University of Toronto). Dynes is a co-founder and organizer of the Hebrew Lab Faculty Seminar, a New-York based workgroup for scholars in Hebrew Literature.
Credits:
Cover Image: Alter Kacyzne / "Lublin, 1924. The Saul Wahl Synagogue, the oldest in the city".