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Welcome to Vallentine Mitchell Publishers!
Vallentine Mitchell, founded over fifty years ago, are international publishers of books of Jewish interest, both for the scholar and general reader. Subjects published include Jewish history, culture and heritage, modern Jewish thought, biography and reference.
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| | |  | Featured Titles Frank's Way
Black, Gerry
Frank Cass and Fifty Years of Publishing
This is a history of Frank Cass, the man, and Frank Cass, the company. The two are inextricably linked together, so it is inevitably a mixture of both a company history and a biography, set against the dramatically changing background of the publishing trade during more than fifty challenging years. It recounts the story of Frank's life, from when as a 19-year-old he started the first day of his working life as an assistant in a bookshop, through being a bookshop owner selling antiquarian and other second-hand books, to an independent publisher reprinting out-of-print academic books, then new academic books, and finally academic journals that covered a wide field ranging from politics and military studies to sport and the environment, from international human rights to European security, from legal history to middle eastern studies. His working life spanned almost sixty years from 1949 to 2007, and each decade presented its own challenges and opportunities. Frank survived the 1950s when the country was recovering from the austerity that followed the Second World War; the 1960s, a period of growth but one demanding additional capital to feed it; the 1970s of Edward Heath's three day week and James Callaghan's 'winter of discontent'; the 1980s, when almost every publishing firm, including some of the largest, was forced to make severe cutbacks and lay off staff; and the 1990s and the millennium which brought with them the spectacular growth of the Internet which many believed would threaten the very existence of the book and lead to its demise in its traditional form. Although Frank Cass & Co was much the largest part of Frank's publishing interests, in the 1970s he invested in Irish Academic Press and Vallentine Mitchell. After the sale of Frank Cass & Co to Taylor & Francis, Frank devoted much of his time to developing the lists of these two companies, remaining actively involved with both until just a few weeks before he passed away. Through a mixture of history and anecdote, this book tells the story of Frank Cass's great adventure in publishing.
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|  | 1001 Questions and Answers on Pesach
Cohen, Jeffrey
[from Chief Rabbi Professor Jonathan Sacks] Rabbi Cohen writes within a great tradition, bringing together Torah and chokmah, Jewish wisdom and the broad panoply of human knowledge, and finding in their interplay a never-ending source of deepened understanding. He is both sage and man of faith, a lucid teacher and a source of inspiration, and no one will read this work without discovering that the festival they thought they knew so well has a depth and history that are enthralling. --- [from The Jewish Week] Öencyclopedic in breadth, features queries that lead the reader through preparation for the holiday, its historical background, symbolism of the seder ritual, commentary on the Haggadah, special festival services in synagogue, and Pesach customs from around the world. As Rabbi Cohen, the author of several books who leads the largest Orthodox congregation in Great Britain believes , "Questions are of the very essence of the spirit of this festival.
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|  | Cartoons and Extremism
Kotek, Joel
Israel and the Jews in Arab and Western Media
The outrage sparked by the Danish cartoon affair - the publication of images of the Prophet Muhammad in the European press - was a sharp reminder of the potency of the cartoon in the modern media. It is one of the most popular and effective means of communication. By exaggerating and exasperating, cartoons by their very nature lack neutrality, and the cartoon is an important weapon in the Middle Eastern crisis. In response to the Danish cartoon affair, an Iranian newspaper announced a competition for cartoons about the Holocaust, even though it had nothing to do with Israel or the Jewish people. Antisemitic cartoons have long been rife in the Arab-Muslim media. The September 2001 Durban Conference against Racism, intended to denounce and combat racism in all its forms, also featured the distribution of antisemitic cartoons by an Arab organization, yet this elicited no reaction from Western NGOs at the conference. This event set the author on a trail that revealed thousands of such drawings. In the name of anti-Zionism, Jews are depicted as sadistic and bloodthirsty monsters, solely interested in money and power. This return to anti-Jewish hatred is of a new order, in line with current trends ñ an Arab-Muslim form unexpectedly metamorphosed from the antisemitism traditionally linked with the Christian West. By reproducing more than 400 of these cartoons, taken from both Arab and Western media, this book denounces the use of hatred in the media and hopes to raise the alarm.
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|  | The Spread of Islamikaze Terrorism in Europe
Israeli, Raphael
Here the outspoken academic Raphael Israeli deals with radical Islam's attempt to gain a solid foothold on the European continent through immigration (legal and illegal) and political refugee status, all calculated to expand the influence of Islam by taking advantage of the Western liberal and democratic governments accommodating them as guests - and then as citizens. The democratic freedom in which they now live allows them to say and do things which the far stricter regimes of Islamic countries do not tolerate. The three major countries of Europe most affected by Muslim immigration and demographic presence are France, Britain and Germany, who host about half of the total of 30 million Muslims in Europe today. This book examines the increasing presence of radical Islam within this Muslim diaspora in Europe, and the confusions and divisions within Western governments about how to engage with radical Islam and police its criminal elements. It examines the escalating impact of radical Islam in Europe, showing the larger picture.
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|  | Genocide, the World Wars and the Unweaving of Europe
Bloxham, Donald
The murder of at least one million Armenian Christians in 1915-16 and of some six million Jews from 1939-45 were the most extreme instances of mass murder in the First and Second World Wars respectively. This book examines the development and dynamics of both genocides. While bringing out the many differences in the origins, course, and nature of the crimes, the book argues that both need to be placed into the context of the wider violent agendas and demographic schemes of the perpetrator states. In the earlier case, it is important to consider the Ottoman violence against Assyrian Christians and Greek Orthodox subjects, and programs of forced assimilation of non-Turkish Muslim groups, including many Muslims victimized by other states. In the later case, it is impossible to understand the development of the 'final solution of the Jewish question' without paying attention to Nazi policy against Slavic groups, the 'disabled,' and Europe's Romany population. Both genocides, furthermore, need to be examined in the deeper contexts of the multi-causal violence resulting from the collapse of the eastern and southeastern European dynastic empires from the late nineteenth century, and from the establishment of new types of state in their aftermath. Finally, the book explains why these two major genocides occupy very different places in our contemporary memorial culture. It argues that the memory politics of the Armenian genocide illustrate the very tight limits to what we can expect in the way of meaningful international concern for ongoing genocides. Meanwhile, the instrumentalization of the memory of the Holocaust can actually inhibit self-criticism on the parts of the western states that increasingly foreground Holocaust memorial days and museums in their civic education.
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|  | Jews and Europe in the Twenty-First Century
Lambert, Nick
Thinking Jewish
Jews and Europe in the Twenty-First Century is a collection of interviews with more than ninety prominent Jewish intellectuals, politicians, writers and scientists from across Western Europe. Nick LambertÌs penetrating interviews and analyses reveal their thoughts, fears and hopes for the future. Deep disquiet and insecurity, even among those who hold "establishment" positions, is uncovered. The author also explores why Jews have not been involved in constructing the European Union - and shows why they should have been. He concludes that Jews will continue to observe the shaping of the European project from an upstairs window - with most longing to be part of a Europe which has now vanished, or been extinguished, and which some of the interviewees admit to having attempted to sustain in their novel-writing. In this unique collection the interviewees reveal that they have often felt alien both to Jewish communal life and to the national societies in which they live, with their relationship to Israel a further controversial area. Lambert shows that we are approaching a time of cultural clashes between different groups of Jews in Europe, in which the future of Jewish identity will be rooted either in Western liberal values or in stricter religious observance. In an age in which political Islam dominates the headlines, this book provides an insiderÌs view of life among another seminal, divided, yet often forgotten group in Europe.
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|  | Israeli Society, the Holocaust and its Survivors
Porat, Dina
This collection of twenty essays analyzes the encounters of the Yishuv (the Hebrew community in pre-state Israel) and Israeli society with the Holocaust while it occurred, and with its survivors. Sixty years after the end of the Second World War, this is still a painful topic, very much at the center of the agendas of both Israel and the Jewish communities worldwide, focusing on a soul-searching issue: was the tragedy unfolding in Europe part and parcel of public life in the Yishuv, its priorities and anxieties, and did Israeli society embrace the survivors as they deserved? Based on a wide scope of primary sources and on many years of research, the essays deal with a variety of poignant sub-issues, such as the attitudes of David Ben-Gurion, Martin Buber and other leaders, the understanding of the information about the 'Final Solution', relations and tensions between the Yishuv and the Jewish communities and youth movements in Nazi-occupied Europe, rescue plans and their failure, decisions regarding rescue made during a global war, and parallel changes in the attitude to the survivors and in Israeli and Jewish identity. The balanced answers provided in this collection take into consideration the limited resources of a small community under a mandate and of a young, post-war country flooded by immigration, and the many dominant factors present during a world war and in its aftermath on which the Yishuv and Israel could have no impact, yet could not avoid criticism and pin-pointing of failures and deficiencies.
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|  | Cecilia Razovsky and the American Jewish Women's Rescue Operations in the Second World War
Zucker, Bat-Ami
This book highlights Jewish women's activities in the 1930s and 1940s as they were reflected in one outstanding woman ó Cecilia Razovsky. Her wide range of activities spanning more than fifty years and her outstanding devotion to assisting refugees and refugee children reveal her as a woman who dedicated her personal life and her professional skills to the Jewish people. Without doubt, she stands as a representative for the thousands of anonymous American-Jewish women, who made a difference. The book is based on primary sources. The Jewish-American campaign for the European refugees before and during the Second World War is commonly perceived as having been spearheaded by male leaders. Stephen Wise is the most familiar and outstanding figure among them; other frequently mentioned personalities include Cyrus Adler, Herbert Lehman, Judge Joseph Proskauer, Judge Julius Mack, and Morris Troper. Together, these leaders have been credited for their efforts to persuade the Roosevelt administration to open US doors to Jewish refugees. But although women, too, were deeply involved in Jewish community welfare projects, they were seldom recognized for their activities, and certainly were not accorded the attention they deserve in contemporary historiography. In the tragic years before, during, and after the Second World War, it was the vital role played by ordinary groups of Jewish women far from the spotlight, and their mighty efforts to establish and maintain a firm organizational foundation, that enabled the refugee workers to execute their goals.
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|  | ORT, the Second World War and the Rehabilitation of Holocaust Survivors
Kavanaugh, Sarah
This book centres on the role played by ORT in the rehabilitation of Holocaust survivors inside the Displaced Persons (DP) camps after the Second World War. A brief history of the ORT organisation is followed by the author highlighting ORT's work during the 1920s and 1930s, using Berlin as a case study. The important and often life-saving work carried out by ORT workers inside the ghettos of Eastern Europe, primarily in Warsaw and Kovno, is then examined. The book then focuses on the liberation of the concentration camps, the set-up of the post-war allied zones of occupation, the establishment of the DP camps, and ORT's arrival within them. The mature period of ORT's work in the DP camps is then covered, looking at Belsen in the British zone of occupation and Landsberg in the American zone. The book also explores ORT's work in Austria and Italy. The final chapter highlights the closure of the DP camps, the subsequent immigration of the DPs, and the creation of the State of Israel.
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|  | Chinese and Jews
Eber, Irene
Encounters Between Cultures
This book deals with the large variety of contacts that constitute intercultural relations. These studies suggest the different areas ñ literature, history, society ñ research can take to discover the interaction of ideas and peoples. It furthermore illustrates how widely disparate cultures can communicate over time and space as well as the different means that are employed in cultural adjustment. Contents include: Jewish Communities in China: A Brief Overview --- Kaifeng Jews: Sinification and the Persistence of Identity and History --- Destination Shanghai, Permits, and Transit Visas, 1938ñ1941 --- Translating the Ancestors: SIJ Schereschewskyís 1875 Chinese Version of Genesis --- Notes on the Early Reception of the Old Testament --- Several Psalms in Chinese Translation --- Translation Literature in Modern China: The Yiddish Author and his Tale --- Martin Buber and Daoism
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|  | We Are Strangers Here
Borchardt, Ruth
An Enemy Alien in Prison in 1940
Ruth Borchardt's Interned: An Enemy Alien in Holloway Prison, reproduced here with an introduction by Charmian Brinson, was written but not completed in 1943, and only came to light after the author's recent death. The novel vividly describes the plight of a young German refugee, Anna Silver, as an 'enemy alien' in Britain on the outbreak of war, and her subsequent detention in Holloway Prison, a situation made more complex by her young child. The novel finishes as Anna Silver arrives at the Internment Camp on the Isle of Man. The second part of the novel, dealing with events on the Isle of Man, was planned but appears never to have been written. This book highlights the plight of German anti-Nazis and Jews in British exile and has a distinct air of tragicomedy about it. Little has been written on the internment of women during the Second World War, and this book will appeal to readers interested in modern history, social history, and women's studies.
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|  | Jewish Travel Guide Jewish Travel Guide 2008
For almost fifty years the Jewish Travel Guide has been the essential reference book for all Jewish travellers worldwide, whether travelling on business, for pleasure, or to seek their historical roots. Rigorously edited and up-dated every year, each country has a short commentary including demographic details, emergency numbers, and dialling codes. Other information includes restaurants, mikvaot, synagogues, theatres, embassies, museums, hotels, booksellers, cultural festivals, media, community organisations, groceries, bakeries, kosher food, butchers, delicatessens, libraries, and tourist sites. There's even a guide to kosher fish across the world. The Jewish Travel Guide is universally recognised as the ultimate source of information for the Jew abroad. The Jewish Review says, "It is a must for every traveller" the Jewish Chronicle observes, "The book validates its motto: ‘Don't go without it’" The Jerusalem Post comments, "The Guide offers a well-rounded demographic portrait of world Jewry today, serving as much as a handbook and resource for professionals in the Jewish world, as a travel guide." The Jewish Travel Guide is the essential travelling companion, making your journey even easier and more pleasurable!
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|  | Jewish Year Book 2008
Stephen W. Massil
The Jewish Year Book 2007 provides a comprehensive directory of the communal institutions and organisations that make up the fabric of British Jewish society. It is a guide to the structures and networks of the religious, social, educational, cultural, and welfare organisations of the Jewish community across the British Isles and reports the ever-changing pattern of websites, now such a pervasive feature of communal management and presentation. It also offers an extensive guide to the primary organisations of the Jewish communities of the world and a substantial survey of Israel and its organisations that have associations with British Jewry, including a comprehensive list of Israel’s overseas embassies and missions. It sets out the basic facts of the history of Jewish settlement in Britain and an up-to-date statement of UK legislation specifically concerned with the place of the Jews and Jewish identity in Britain. Updated annually, edited to provide the latest, up-to-date information, it includes contact details for Jewish institutions, local and international organisations, details on leading Jewish personalities, obituaries, and major events as well as principal festivals and fasts. There is also a detailed calendar, including the Jewish calendar for thirty years and evening twilight regional variations.
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Rabbi Louis Jacobs was recently voted the Greatest British Jew since Cromwell allowed Jews back into England 350 years ago by readers of the Jewish Chronicle.
To see all of his books published by Vallentine Mitchell Publishers please clicking below. 
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| Dr. Trude Levi Recognized
On 8th April 2008 Dr. Trude Levi was presented with the Officer's Cross of the Order of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany by the Minister Plenipotentiary of the German Embassy at the German Residence in London in recognition of her tireless work in raising Holocaust awareness. Her two books A Cat Called Adolf and Did You Ever Meet Hitler, Miss? are available from Vallentine Mitchell.
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