British Library Writing Britain exhibition celebrating British authors – Bernard Kops in the loop

Bernard Kops is one of 150 celebrated authors who feature in  The British Library’s forthcoming exhibition  Writing Britain: From Wastelands to Wonderlands ( May 11 – September 25) which  promises to be a cornucopia for literature lovers  with iconic British novels, poems and illustrations displayed in all kinds of formats. With artefacts such as a  William Blake notebook and Lewis Carroll’s diary to slaver over and origional Shakespeare and Chaucer works.  Kops  and other contemporary writers were commissioned to perform and explain in a  newly commissioned video, their  sense of place in Britain today and how their work reflects Britain’s unique landscapes.  Kops’s contribution involves reading poems and talking about how he draws inspiration from  his Jewish East End roots .

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Launch of Bernard Kops “The Odyssey of Samuel Glass” at Jewish Museum

Bernard Kops  will be launching his acclaimed new novel The Odyssey of Samuel Glass  at the Jewish Museum in Camden Town, on Sunday June 17th at 3pm

With readings by actor Stephen Reif

www.jewishmuseum.org.uk  tel 7284 7384  128-131 Albert Street, London NW1 7NB

Reviews of The Odyssey

Mark Lawson Front Row BBC Radio4  ” Watch out for an appearance by Anne Frank, one of the historic figures  met by a Jewish teenager who achieves time travel in Bernard Kops new novel The Odyssey of Samuel Glass.” 

 Jewish Chronicle “Set in Muswell Hill and Hoop lane as well as in 19^th century Russia with a rabbinical guide and the ghost of Anne Frank.  If that’s not the recipe for a perfect Jewish coming-of-age novel, what is? (Yes, of course there is chicken soup as well.).Samuel Glass is 17 and can hardly open his mouth without uttering a literary quotation much like the polyglot hero of Jack Rosenthal’s Barmitzvah Boy and just as engaging. Unable to get over his father’s death, Samuel travels back in time to search for the meaning of life, as you do. For all ages, teen to grandparents.  

Michael Kustow  “Kops cooks up a coming-of-age journey from Muswell Hill to ancestral Russia and back, studded with jokes, desire, Jewish food, actors, a magical rabbi and music of the spheres. A serious tale that defies gravity.”

 

BBC 1 The Big Questions – Is God a Woman?

 Or a man?  Neither. We anthropomorphise. Most theologians on this programme agreed. Yet they still  argued and were divided over whether there should be women bishops. Historian Bettany Hughes and Rabbi Elli Sarah, battle it out with Rev Canon Dr Gavin Ashenden  and Rabbi Pesach Efune and others to show how the  overwhelmingly feminine depiction of the divine  in early history was superceded by male images  as warrior tribal societies became dominant. Women were priests in the first 300 years of Christianity says Hughes. A rare treat to see two rabbis going toe to toe on mainstream  TV And a good plug for Bettany Hughes forthcoming series. Divine Women.  

Discussion begins at 42.30 mins   Feature approx 17 mins 

 http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b01gg5dt/The_Big_Questions_Series_5_Episode_14/