Stefan Kanfer

Stefan Kanfer (May 17, 1933 – June 19, 2018) was an American journalist, critic, editor, and author.^{[1][2][3][4][5][6]}

Background[]

Stefan Kanfer was born on May 17, 1933, in New York City and raised there and in Hastings-on-Hudson. His family were Jews from Romania, and he spoke Yiddish. His father was a schoolteacher during the Great Depression during Kanfer's early childhood. He attended New York University.^[1][3][4]

Career[]

In the early 1950s, Kanfer served in an army intelligence unit during the Korean War.^[1]

Experience included: "bohemian" in Paris, advertising, military interrogator, writer of cartoon captions, and TV gag-writer.^[4]

In the early 1960s, he became a film critic, book critic, and senior editor at Time magazine for more than 20 years when Henry Grunwald ran the magazine. (When Grunwald retired, Kanfer spoke at his retirement party.^[4]) Colleagues there included Lance Morrow. He left Time staff in 1987 and contributed articles for another five years.^[1][2][3][4]

After Time, he became drama critic for The New Leader, and then contributing editor or writer on arts, culture, and politics for the City Journal (under managing editor Myron Magnet^[4]), The Wall Street Journal, and other publications.^[1][2]

Personal life and death[]

Kanfer was married to Dorothy May Markey Kanfer ("May"), daughter of John Markey and Dorothy Markey (pen name Myra Page).^[1][4]

His circle of friends included: Henry Grunwald, fellow Romanian Jew Elie Wiesel, Lance Morrow, Roger Rosenblatt, John Leo, , , , Chris Porterfield, Michael Walsh, B. J. Phillips, and Gerald Clarke. (With Morrow, Kanfer formed the "Chester A. Arthur Chapter of the Chuck Jones Fan Club of America.")^[3]

With Wiesel, he served on the presidential Wiesel Commission on the Romanian holocaust.^[4]

He served as mentor and supporter of younger writers, played the ukulele and musical saw, and held concerts and film presentations in his home.^[1]

Kanfer died on June 19, 2018, age 85, in Sleepy Hollow, New York.^[1]

Awards[]

• New York Public Library honoree^[1]
• Academy Award-nominated documentary^[4]

Works[]

Kanfer published 16 books and numerous articles, numerous songs, plays, essays, and reviews.^[1][2]

Books[]

• Journal of the plague years (1973)
• Eighth sin (1978)
• Fear itself (1981)
• International garage sale (1985)
• Summer world: the attempt to build a Jewish Eden in the Catskills from the days of the ghetto to the rise and decline of the Borscht Belt (1989)
• Last empire: De Beers, diamonds, and the world (1993)
• Serious business: the art and commerce of animation in America from Betty Boop to Toy story (1997)
• Groucho: the life and times of Julius Henry Marx (2000)
• Essential Groucho: writings by, for, and about Groucho Marx (edited and introduction by Stefan Kanfer) (2000)
• Ball of fire: the tumultuous life and comic art of Lucille Ball (2003)
• Stardust lost: the triumph, tragedy, and mishugas of the Yiddish theater in America (2006, 2007)
• Voodoo that they did so well: the wizards who invented the New York stage (2007)
• Somebody: the reckless life and remarkable career of Marlon Brando (2008)
• Tough without a gun: the life and extraordinary afterlife of Humphrey Bogart (2011)
• Borscht Belt: revisiting the remains of America's Jewish vacationland (photographs by Marisa Scheinfeld, essays by Stefan Kanfer and Jenna Weissman Joselit) (2016)
• Hell money (2018)

Articles[]

• "The Yiddish Theater", The Atlantic Monthly October 9, 1963
• "Meisterzinger", The Atlantic Monthly (December 1970)
• "Soul Destroyed", Time (July 5, 1971)
• ""Tolstoy was wrong" (review), The Harpers Monthly (September 1972)
• "The trivialization of evil" (review), The Harpers Monthly (April 1973)
• "American Chronicle", Encounter (November 1974)
• "Lightning Has Once Hit Near Me" (review), The New Republic (December 15, 1979)
• "Downstream" (review), The New Republic (September 6, 1980)
• "Two Cheers for Zoroaster" (review) The New Republic (April 25, 1981)
• "U.N. in Adidas" (review), The New Republic (September 16, 1981)
• "The Politics of the Playpen" (review), The New Republic (December 23, 1981)
• "The Perversity of G.S." (review), The New Republic (April 21, 1982)
• "The Secret Modernist", The New Republic (May 26, 1982)
• "Madame De Style" (review), The New Republic (July 30, 1984)
• "Captain Marvel on Capitalism", The New Republic (February 25, 1985)
• "The Anglo File" (review), The New Republic (August 11, 1986)
• "Lost in Greeneland" (review), The New Republic (November 2, 1987)
• "Isaac Singer's Promised City"", City Journal (Summer 1997)
• "The Newest American Credo", City Journal (Spring 1998)
• "Time Heals All Wounds", City Journal (Spring 1998)
• "It's Their Money", City Journal (Summer 1999)
• "The Dung Hits the Fan", City Journal (Autumn 1999)
• "And on the Right, Charles Dickens", City Journal (Winter 1999)
• "Good Literature Lives!", City Journal (Spring 2000)
• "The Post Office Stamps Out the 1980s", City Journal (Spring 2000)
• "The New Blacklist", City Journal (Summer 2000)
• "Defending the Indefensible", City Journal (Autumn 2000)
• "Elementary Con Job", City Journal (Autumn 2000)
• "A Little Touch of Mozart in New York", City Journal (Spring 2001)
• A Modest Proposal", City Journal (Spring 2001)
• "The Scout Wars", City Journal (Summer 2001)
• "The Consolations of History", City Journal (Autumn 2001)
• "The Americanization of Irving Berlin", City Journal (Spring 2002)
• "How to Trivialize the Holocaust", City Journal (Spring 2002)
• "America's Dumbest Intellectual", City Journal (Summer 2002)
• "Expurgated Exams", City Journal (Summer 2002)
• "Fox Has Morals?", City Journal (Winter 2002)
• "Why the Scouts Ban Homosexuals", City Journal (Winter 2002)
• "Richard Rodgers", City Journal (Autumn 2003)
• "See-No-Evil Journalists", City Journal (Autumn 2003)
• "Rather Not", City Journal (Autumn 2004)
• "Christo-mania", City Journal (Summer 2004)
• "The Czarinas of Beauty", City Journal (Summer 2004)
• "Just the Highlights", City Journal (Summer 2004)
• "Yuck!", City Journal (Summer 2004)
• "Sondheim vs. Sondheim", City Journal (Autumn 2004)
• "The Columbian Cartel", City Journal (Spring 2005)
• "Urbanities: Vaudeville's Brief Shining Moment", City Journal (Spring 2005)
• "What Ails the Dems?", City Journal (Summer 2005)
• "Poshlost at Ground Zero", City Journal (Autumn 2005)
• "Peacenik Warmongers", City Journal (Autumn 2005)
• "Play Balco!", City Journal (Winter 2005)
• "Hi, Ho! Steverino" (review), The Weekly Standard (December 5, 2005)
• "Stately McMansions" (review), The Weekly Standard (March 27, 2006)
• "Soccer Louts", City Journal (Summer 2006)
• "The Dynamo and the Jeweler", City Journal (Autumn 2006)
• "Warrior Princess", City Journal (Autumn 2006)
• "France vs. France", City Journal (Winter 2006)
• "Love and Glory in East Aurory"", City Journal (Spring 2007)
• "The Big Lie", City Journal (Winter 2007)
• "Richard Pryor: Stand-Up Philosopher", City Journal (March 2009)
• "The Gold Bubble", City Journal (June 2, 2010)
• "City Lights", City Journal (September 2, 2010)

References[]