Orli Santo’s moving article on the lamented closing of the legendary Cornelia Street Café (“Israeli Musicians Blue Over Cornelia Street’s Demise,” Dec. 21) is deficient in a crucial respect.
Inexplicitly missing in the article is any mention of Cornelia Street’s visionary founder and long-time grand poobah, Robin Hirsch. Hirsch, an Oxford-educated Brit and a child of Holocaust survivors, is the author of the classic post-Holocaust memoir “Last Dance at the Hotel Kempinski.”
In addition to being a creative impresario who brought not only jazz but cutting-edge literature to the café, Robin was active in theater, in Europe and in the United States, for decades, teaching, acting, directing and producing.
Robin Hirsch was Cornelia Street; Cornelia was Robin.
Manhattan
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