Dr. Ellen Frankel served for eighteen years as the Editor in Chief and CEO of The Jewish Publication Society. She received her B.A. from the University of Michigan and her Ph.D. in Comparative Literature from Princeton University. 

She is the author of eleven books, among them The Classic Tales: 4000 Years of Jewish Lore; The Encyclopedia of Jewish Symbols; The Five Books of Miriam; The Jewish Spirit; and The Illustrated Hebrew Bible. She is a contributor to Three Testaments: Torah, Gospel, and Quran, edited by Brian Arthur Brown. She has also written three books for young people. Her JPS Illustrated Children’s Bible won the 2010 National Jewish Book Award.

She has written librettos for several chamber pieces: The Golem Psalms and “Hagar,” with music by Andrea Clearfield; The Esther Diaries with Haralabos Stafylakis; and Mothers of Moses with Rene Orth. Her opera, Slaying the Dragon, with music by Michael Ching, premiered in Philadelphia in 2012. Her second opera, The Triangle Fire, premiered in New York in 2017. Her oratorio, Beyond the Binary, with Andrea Clearfield, will premiere in Philadelphia in Spring 2022.

Discussion Topic:

Drawing from her book, The Five Books of Miriam (Putnam 1996; HarperSanFrancisco pb, 1998), Dr. Ellen Frankel presents this ancient text through a prism of women's voices, including Our Mothers, Our Bubbes, the Rabbis, the Sages in Our Own Time, as well as a host of biblical women such as Lilith the Rebel, Mother Rachel, Wily Rebecca, and Dinah the Wounded One. She explores how new questions can uncover ancient secrets, how modern research and scholarship can shed new light on the past, and how today's women can engage in conversation with their biblical counterparts. Frankel's work is a blend of feminism, Jewish tradition, and what she calls "Folk Torah.".