Storytelling, survival, and the age of AI: Author Etgar Keret at U-M
By Caitlyn Gordon
The University of Michigan Frankel Center for Judaic Studies is proud to host an extraordinary evening with celebrated Israeli author and filmmaker Etgar Keret on Wednesday, September 23. Keret, an internationally acclaimed voice known for his surreal and darkly comedic short stories, will present a talk titled “Me, Myself and AI: Where Human Creativity and Algorithms Intersect” at 5 p.m. in the Rackham Graduate School Amphitheater. Interested attendees should RSVP at https://myumi.ch/A1Apn.
Etgar Keret is a celebrated Israeli author and filmmaker known for his unique, surreal, and darkly comedic short stories. Keret spent time engaging with AI models to test the limits of what a machine could generate in terms of stories and narratives. For Keret, the act of telling stories is more than an art form; it is a means of survival. As the child of Holocaust survivors, Keret’s work often fuses the bizarre with the banal, finding humor and humanity in the most surreal circumstances. Attendees can expect an evening that is as intellectually stimulating as it is emotionally resonant.
Keret’s books have been published in over 45 languages and are bestsellers in Israel. He won the prestigious Sapir Prize and the Prime Minister’s Prize. More than 60 short movies and full-length features were based on his short stories. Keret teaches creative writing at Ben-Gurion University of the Negev and directs the new MFA program at the Jewish Theological Seminary in New York. Since 2021, he has been publishing a weekly Substack newsletter titled Alphabet Soup. His latest short-story collection, Autocorrect, was published in 2025. Autocorrect will be available for purchase at this event, alongside a selection of Keret’s other books including The Seven Good Years (2015) and Suddenly a Knock on the Door (2010), through Literati Bookstore.
Don’t miss this opportunity to hear from one of the most inventive minds in contemporary literature as he navigates the fascinating intersection of human imagination and technology.
About the Jean & Samuel Frankel Center for Judaic Studies
Since its establishment as a center in 1988, the University of Michigan Jean & Samuel Frankel Center for Judaic Studies has become one of the world’s leading Jewish Studies programs in a broad array of fields and disciplines. Learn more about the Frankel Center at https://lsa.umich.edu/judaic.
