The 2024 Jacob Isaac Segal Awards
Tuesday, December 3, 2024 | 7:00-9:00 PM
Gelber Conference Center
5151 Chem. de la Côte-Sainte-Catherine Montréal, H3W 1M6
Marc Raboy’s Looking for Alicia: The Unfinished Life of an Argentinian Rebel (House of Anansi Press)
is a riveting personal journey of discovery that takes the reader into the terror of Argentina’s 1970s military dictatorship – a period that haunts the country to this day and had such a devastating impact on Argentina’s large and thriving Jewish community.
Ber Kotlerman’s collection of stories, Samoyed (Ivo Press)
narrates his family’s saga of migration across generations and territories that stretch from Ukraine to Birobidzhan. Moving between realism and the fantastic, the stories offer an evocative, collective portrait of Soviet Jewry.
Yiddish Lives On: Strategies of Language Transmission
-Rebecca Margolis
In resistance to language decline, Yiddish has emerged as a vehicle for young people to engage with their heritage and identity, and as a site for creative renewal in the Jewish world and beyond. With a spotlight on Canada, Yiddish Lives On explores stories and strategies of language continuity in the home, on the stage and page, and through song and on screen.
Les Juifs de la Révolution tranquille : Regards d’une minorité religieuse sur le Québec de 1945 à
1976
-Simon-Pierre Lacasse
Dans une société largement clivée sur le plan confessionnel entre catholiques et protestants – les « deux solitudes » –, les activistes juifs luttent pour la reconnaissance de leur communauté et incitent les acteurs politiques à réfléchir plus largement à ce que l’on appelle aujourd’hui le « vivre-ensemble ».
Loin de demeurer en marge des espaces public et politique, plusieurs activistes communautaires du Montréal juif prennent la parole et défendent une société québécoise émergente au sein de laquelle le pluralisme occupe un espace grandissant.
Looking for Alicia, The Unfinished Life of an Argentinian Rebel
-Marc Raboy
In Looking for Alicia, Raboy pursues her story not only to learn what happened when the post-Perón government in Argentina turned to state terror but also to understand the lives of those who risked everything to oppose it. Author and subject share more than a surname and a distant ancestral connection; their lives were both marked by youthful rebellion, journalistic ambition, and the radical politics that were a hallmark of the ’60s and ’70s.
Who Gets In
-Norman Ravvin
Who Gets In: An Immigration Story follows Yehuda Yoseph Eisenstein, the author’s grandfather, as he emigrates from Poland in 1930, leaving a young family behind. His departure was followed by years of struggle to bring his wife and children after him to Canada. While Eisenstein settled into small-town Saskatchewan life as an all-purpose religious leader, the country, under a Conservative government, settled into Depression and a dark anti-immigration period. Who Gets In was made possible by archival finds and careful research. It is also an intimate family story, illustrated by the government and immigration-related documents key to its narrative, as well as by photographs of key figures in its narrative. The lesson gained from Eisenstein’s efforts in the face of ruthless authority is never take no for an answer.
BEST QUEBEC BOOK ON A JEWISH THEME
Eligibility criteria
- The author need not be Jewish, but the book must be on a Jewish theme.
- Books must have been written in English or French, have an ISBN, and be commercially available to the public.
- Electronic books are eligible provided they become commercially available in their final form during the eligibility period, and that they meet all the other criteria listed here.
- Standard residency requirement: The author must have a residence in Quebec at the time of submission. A person who has been living continuously outside of Quebec for the past four years will not meet the residency requirement. In the case of joint authorship, one of the two authors must satisfy all the above requirements. Books by more than two authors are not eligible.
- Requirement for non-resident authors: A book by an author who does not meet the residency requirement as defined above (#4) may be submitted, but it must also have Quebec as a significant theme.
- Collections of poetry, short stories or essays are eligible as long as at least 51% of the entire book is comprised of new text. “New” text includes individual pieces – i.e., stories, poems, or essays – not previously published in magazines or journals, including electronic publications.
- “Graphic novels” are eligible, both fiction and non-fiction, if there is a significant textual component. The illustrator is eligible for half the prize money if said illustrator is named on the title page of the book and/or otherwise given credit equal to the writer.
- Anthologies are eligible only if they contain a substantial introduction by the editor(s).
- Translations, reprints, and previously published books are not eligible.
- Notwithstanding #9, rewritten, expanded, or otherwise altered books may be eligible if deemed a new book by JPL.
Self-published books are ineligible.
Books may be submitted by publishers or authors.
Books must be published between January 1, 2022, and December 31, 2023.
Books MUST be submitted in a PDF electronic format, under the category of Best Quebec Book on a Jewish Theme, to: [email protected]
Paper copies of books will not be accepted.
The Jewish Public Library reserves the right to make the final decision regarding the eligibility of any book.
Authors of the books that are shortlisted for the Best Quebec Book on a Jewish Theme award will be expected to submit a short promotional video and be available for public relations activities.
The winner must be present at the December 10, 2024, J.I. Segal Prize event organized by JPL in Montreal.
Deadline for submission: May 31, 2024.
DR. HIRSH AND DVORAH ROSENFELD AWARD FOR YIDDISH LITERATURE
Eligibility criteria
- The submission must be an original work written and published in Yiddish.
- The author may reside anywhere in the world.
- Self-published books are eligible.
- Books may be submitted by publishers or authors.
- Books must be published between January 1, 2022, and December 31, 2023.
- Books MUST be submitted in a PDF electronic format, under the category of the Dr. Hirsh and Dvorah Rosenfeld award for Yiddish literature, to: [email protected]
- Paper copies of books will not be accepted.
- Authors of the books for the Dr. Hirsh and Dvorah Rosenfeld award for Yiddish literature will be expected to participate at an awards event, either in person or by supplying a video, and to be available for public relations activities.
The Jewish Public Library reserves the right to make the final decision regarding the eligibility of any book.
Deadline for submission: May 31, 2024.
About Jacob Isaac Segal
Jacob Isaac Segal (1896-1954) is acknowledged as one of the most respected Yiddish poets. His work is characterized by its deep lyrical expression and evocation of the dignity of Jewish life in the Eastern European shtetl and in Canada. Segal strove to show that “a people and its culture are inseparable.” His poetry lives on in Yiddish and in translation.
About the awards
For over half a century, The Jacob Isaac Segal Awards have honoured the exploration of Jewish themes in literature and recognized the contribution of Jewish culture to a richly diverse contemporary Quebec.
The Jacob Isaac Segal Awards of the Jewish Public Library are made possible by the J.I. Segal Cultural Foundation, founded by the late Dr. Hirsh Rosenfeld and Mrs. Dvorah Rosenfeld. They were established in 1968 to honour and perpetuate the memory of the great Yiddish-Canadian poet, J.I. Segal, and to foster Jewish cultural creativity in Canada.
The purpose of the awards, presented every two years, is to encourage and reward creative works on Jewish themes and to recognize contributions in Jewish education, both formal and informal.
Pierre Samson
Le Mammouth
Borris Sandler
Antiques from my Travel Bag
Goldie Morgentaler
Collected edition of translated pieces by Chava Rosenfarb
Lori St-Martin
and Paul Gagné Sandler
Yiddish for Pirates
