T here isn’t a contemporary writer it seems who wasn’t influenced — in most cases directly — by Rabbi Nisson Wolpin. The Jewish Observer was the breeding ground for the foremost names in Jewish literature and thought.
I never really made it though I tried.
I submitted a piece in defense of those who get drunk on Purim an attempt to reveal the glory inherent in a very misunderstood mitzvah. He called the pay phone in my kollel and thanked me for the handwritten faxed submission encouraging me to write more. He told me how much he enjoyed the piece but explained that the members of his editorial board weren’t the “I got mamesh stoned this Purim” types and wouldn’t appreciate the position or approach. (I thought maybe if he’d print it they would become that type.)
Over the years I enjoyed other conversations with him. I never grew close enough to be a talmid like many of my colleagues but certainly was an admirer and so I read and reread each of the beautiful tributes published after his passing.
