Category
marlene adler marks
The clout of Judge Stanley Mosk
Jonathan Kirsch
March 7, 2013
A new biography of California Supreme Court Justice Stanley Mosk opens with an apt quote from the late and much-loved Jewish Journal columnist Marlene Adler Marks: “Mosk,” Marks wrote in these pages in 1997, “is California history with a heartbeat.”
First Person – God Laughs?
Marlene Adler Marks
June 29, 2006
My girlfriend \”E\” was the first to declare what others had been observing for a while. \”God sure is having a good laugh,\” she said. \”You write a column called \’A Woman\’s Voice.\’ And yet you have no voice\”. The irony had crossed my mind.
Oh So Sorry
Marlene Adler Marks
August 29, 2002
I\’m sorry I haven\’t eaten more hot dogs.
Saturday is Selichot, the time when the whole Jewish world sings with Connie Francis, \”I\’m sorry,\” and vows to do better next time. Many of us are focused on the wrongs we\’ve done to others, or even to God.
Minority Report
Marlene Adler Marks
July 4, 2002
Steven Spielberg\’s new film, "Minority Report," is not exactly a deep take on the problems of "knowing," but since you\’ll probably see it anyway, here\’s where it brought me.
The film, based on a science fiction story by Philip K. Dick, argues that the future can indeed be known. Moreover, our security depends upon finding a Pinchas, a zealot who knows what crimes are being committed, and personally stops them. So anxious are we to hire this Pinchas, this future-knower, that we would sacrifice our freedoms for him.
It is 2054 in a dark, police-state Washington, D.C, all murder has been foretold by three mermaid-type creatures called precogs, so named because they have pre-cognition. The crimes are prerecorded in the future, then replayed in real time, at which point they are interrupted and prevented by a precrime squad headed by John Anderton (Tom Cruise), the very Pinchas we are seeking. Pretty neat.
Talk to Me
Marlene Adler Marks
June 27, 2002
I owe my life\’s work to Ann Landers. And, of course, her sister, Dear Abby. Dr. Rose Franzblau. And Dr. Joyce Brothers.
In the Soup
Marlene Adler Marks
May 2, 2002
My parents visited a year ago while I recuperated from lung cancer surgery and they developed a division of labor.My father would do odd jobs around the house. My mother would feed me.
This was a good plan in theory, but in reality, it had loopholes. My father\’s tasks were well-defined: fix a fence, change a light bulb. But my mother struggled. What is it exactly her middle-aged daughter with upper-middle-class tastes liked to eat? The fact is that both of us had long since stopped cooking most of our meals, taking our nourishment from restaurants and take-out. Nevertheless, there persisted in her the belief that when a child is sick, only homemade foods will do. Familiar, nourishing, Jewish foods.
Travel Machismo
Marlene Adler Marks
April 25, 2002
As Israeli-Palestinian violence makes daily life in the Jewish state a living (as opposed to a virtual) nightmare, American Jews are raising the ante on expressions of loyalty. A rabbi recently told me he wants every Jew to travel to Israel this year. A lay leader puts his name on the list for every mission, but breathes a sigh of relief when each is quickly cancelled.
Honoring Marlene
Rob Eshman
April 25, 2002
Marlene Adler Marks\’ first column for this paper appeared in March 1987. It was titled \”The Unwanted Visitor.\” It was about a rabbi who showed up to comfort Marlene as she waited in the hospital for her husband, Burton, to come out of surgery. \”It hadn\’t been comforting to me,\” Marlene wrote, shortly before Burton died. \”I couldn\’t handle it. There is a time when even a rabbi can do no good at all.\”
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