Beth Kaplan
Beth Kaplan | |
|---|---|
| Born | Elizabeth Kaplan 1 August 1950 |
| Nationality | Canadian |
| Occupation(s) | Writer, Teacher |
| Relatives | Jacob Gordin (great-grandfather) |
Beth Kaplan (born 1 August 1950) is a Canadian writer, teacher, and actor.
Early life[edit]
Kaplan began her professional acting career in 1970, with a school touring production for Toronto's Young People's Theatre.[1] She worked for a decade as an actor, primarily in Vancouver. She appeared in nine tours, including one national tour. She left the stage in 1980 to earn an MFA in creative writing at the University of British Columbia.
She has taught personal essay and memoir writing at Toronto Metropolitan University (previously Ryerson University) since 1994 and also at the University of Toronto since 2007, wherein 2012 she won U of T's Excellence in Teaching Award. A fellow of the Banff Centre's Literary Journalism program, she produces So True,[2] a twice-yearly reading series for her long-term students and herself, at the Black Swan in Toronto. A board and conference committee member of the Creative Nonfiction Collective,[3] she gave a master class at a recent conference entitled "The Writer as Performer."
Career[edit]
Through the nineties, Kaplan had scores of essays published in newspapers and magazines and on CBC radio.[4] Her first book,Finding the Jewish Shakespeare: The Life and Legacy of Jacob Gordin, a biography of her great-grandfather, was published in 2006 and reissued in paperback in 2012.[5] It was called "a witty, shrewd, elegant book which tells a story of vital importance" by Tony Kushner.[6] She spoke about the book across Canada, four times in New York including at the 92nd Street Y,[7] in other American cities, in French in Paris,[8] and at Oxford University.[9] In 2008 she delivered the annual Wexler Lecture in Jewish History in Washington, D.C.
Her memoir All My Loving: Coming of Age with Paul McCartney in Paris, and her textbook on creative writing True to Life: 50 Steps to Help You Tell Your Story, appeared in 2014.[10][11]
Her memoir Loose Woman, published in 2020, is the story of her fraught years as an actress through the seventies and particularly the year 1979, when living and working with men with disabilities in France changed her life.[12]
Personal life[edit]
Kaplan is the great-granddaughter of the Yiddish playwright Jacob Gordin,[5] the daughter of Canadian scientist and activist Dr. J. Gordin Kaplan,[13] and the niece of the American bridge champion, Edgar Kaplan.
References[edit]
- ^ "Production History 1966 to 2020" (PDF). youngpeoplestheatre.org. Retrieved 5 August 2023.
- ^ "Home". sotrue.ca.
- ^ "Board of Directors – Creative Nonfiction Collective".
- ^ "Official Website of Beth Kaplan".
- ^ a b "Finding The Jewish Shakespeare: The Life And Legacy Of Jacob Gordin". indigo.ca. Retrieved 5 August 2023.
- ^ "Finding the Jewish Shakespeare". Syracuse University Press.
- ^ "MusicalAmerica - Press Releases". www.musicalamerica.com. Retrieved 5 August 2023.
- ^ "La lettre de la Maison de la culture yiddish Bibliothèque Medem - Page 45 - la lettre de la Maison de la culture yiddish Bibliothèque Medem".
- ^ Report of the Oxford Centre for Hebrew and Jewish Studies, Academic Year 2008 - 2009 ochjs.ac.uk p.124
- ^ Kaplan, Beth (18 July 2014). True to Life: Fifty Steps to Help You Write Your Story. BPS Books. ISBN 978-1927483909.
- ^ All My Loving: Coming of Age with Paul McCartney in Paris. BPS Books. April 2014.
- ^ Loose Woman Amazon [dead link]
- ^ Gordin KaplanConcordia University Archived 26 November 2020 at the Wayback Machineref>
External links[edit]
| International | |
|---|---|
| National | |
| Other | |
- 1950 births
- Living people
- Canadian women memoirists
- Canadian stage actresses
- University of British Columbia alumni
- 21st-century Canadian women writers
- 21st-century Canadian biographers
- Canadian women biographers
- 20th-century Canadian actresses
- University of Toronto alumni
- Writers from Vancouver
- Academic staff of Toronto Metropolitan University
- Writers from New York City
- Actresses from New York City
- 21st-century American women writers
- 20th-century American actresses
- American stage actresses
- 21st-century Canadian memoirists
- American women academics