Up Close: Barney Frank and Shulem Deen

by TJC Staff

This week on Up Close, memoirs from two men who blazed a trail by being different from what many expected of them.

Congressman Barney Frank was the first member of Congress to voluntarily come out as gay, and the first to marry someone of the same sex while in office. He also developed a reputation as a confrontational speaker and legislator, who fought for what he believed in. We discuss his book, Frank: A Life in Politics From the Great Society to Same-Sex Marriage.

And then, we see a lot of writing these days from ultra-Orthodox Jews who are leaving or who have left their communities and occasionally their families. But one man started that genre under the blog name “Hasidic Rebel.” He’s now got a memoir out, and Shulem Deen stopped by to discuss All Who Go Do Not Return.

Watch the complete episode of Up Close on TJC on-demand on cable in the TJC Original Series/Interviews category. You can also watch highlights from the episode in the video above, or listen to the complete audio of this episode at the top of this post or by subscribing to our weekly audio podcast at http://feeds.feedburner.com/tjcupclose or on iTunes at https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/tjcs-up-close/id807702211.