Mendele: Yiddish literature and language
____________________________________________________
Contents of Vol. 15.023
August 28 , 2005
1) Henekh Kon, composer (Yvette Metral)
2) On transcription (Lucas Bruyn)
3) Itsik Fefer's poems (Itsik Goldenberg)
4) Who wrote "Grine Bleter"? (Pavel Greenberg)
5) A question about Africa (Sigrid Sohn)
6) klal-shprakh (Allan Nadler)
7) Josef Burg, Yiddish writer (Martin Davis)
8) Shmuel Mett o"h (Shamosim)
1)----------------------------------------------------
Date: July 9, 2005
Subject: Henekh Kon, composer
I am trying to collect the works of this composer who died in NYC in 1972.
I already have the scores of "kdoyshim", and "30 Songs of the Ghetto".
I am looking for two other works:
-an opera: "David and Bathsheba", performed in Warsaw, 1924.
-the music Kon wrote for Peretz's play: "bay nakht oyfn altn mark".
According to I. Fater, Kon created also two octets for strings, and three
poems for violin and piano. Of course I tried already YIVO, Brandeis and so
on... No luck so far. If somebody could give me some handful hints, I
should feel very grateful.
My e-mail: alyvet@noos.fr.
Thanks and all the best,
Yvette Metral
2)----------------------------------------------------
Date: August 9, 2005
Subject: On transcription
Bob Berkovitz comments in Vol. 15.022 on his earlier remark on
Romanised Yiddish, saying that 'a consistent transcription is best'.
Again, that is why YIVO uses a transliteration for all
non-Loshen-Koydesh Yiddish words, in which each Hebrew character is
replaced by one Roman letter (or a fixed combination of two Roman
letters.as ts for tsadek). Weinreich explains the dual spelling system
of Yiddish and the phonemic transcription of Loshen-Koydesh words in
the preface to his dictionary.
It is slightly more difficult to transliterate Roman script in Hebrew
script, because Hebrew misses some letters like the x and c, but one
might for instance transliterate English knee as kuf-nun-ayen-ayen, A
person knowing Yiddish but not familiar with English would never guess
the pronunciation to be nun-yud. He would not be able to pronounce the
word written as knee either. The irregular orthography of English has
nothing to do with transliterating Yiddish. For several languages
written in another script we have a standard transliteration, e.g.
Russian and Sanskrit.
Lucas Bruyn
3)----------------------------------------------------
Date: August 12, 2005
Subject: Re: Itsik Fefer's poems
In response to Jeanette Greenberg's request (Mendele Vol. 15.022) for the
words to Itsik Fefer's "Ikh bin a yid," here are 3 of the 14 verses:
Der vayn fun doyresdikn doyer
Hot mir geshtarkt in vanderveg,
Di beyze shverd fun payn un troyer
Hot nit farnikhtet mayn farmeg.
Mayn folk, mayn gloybn un mayn blien,
Zi hot mayn frayhayt nit geshmidt.
Fun unter shverd hob ikh geshrien:
Ikh bin a yid!
Der kluger kneytsh fun Reb Akive,
Di khokhme fun Yeshayes vort
Hobn gebert mayn dursht, mayn libe,
Un zi mit has tsunoyfgeport.
Der shvung fun makabeyer heldn,
Bar Kokhbas blut in maynem zidt,
Fun ale shtayers fleg ikh meldn:
Ikh bin a yid!
Un oyf tsepikenish di sonim,
Vos greytn kvorim shoyn far mir,
Vel ikh unter di fraye fonen
Nokh hobn nakhes on a shir.
Kh'vel mayne vayngertner farflantsn
Un fun mayn goyrl zayn der shmid,
Kh'vel nokh oyf di sonims keyver tantsn!
Ikh bin a yid!
The other verses can be found in various collections of Fefer's poems. e.g.
the Musterverk anthology No. 14, published in Buenos Aires in l962 ("Dovid
Hofshteyn, Izi Kharik, Itsik Fefer - Oysgeklibene Shriftn).
Itsik Goldenberg
Fort Erie, ON, Canada
P.S. I am posting this message on August 12, the 53rd anniversary of Itsik
Fefer's execution, together with that of many other prominent
Soviet-Yiddish cultural figures, in the Lubyanka prison in Moscow, on
August 12, 1952.
4)----------------------------------------------------
Date: August 19, 2005
Subject: Who wrote "Grine Bleter"?
I'm trying to establish who was composer of this song, sometimes called by
its first stanza "Shpil, tzigayner, mir a lidl".
As far as I know, some sources credits Itzik Manger as a composer, others -
Moishe Oysher, which, for example, sang this song in "Dem Hazn Zindl"
movie.
But in that movie's titles we also can read:
Musical Score Composed and Directed
by Alexander Olshanetsky.
Of course, this reference hasn't single meaning like "Music Composed", but
...maybe it is really Olshanetsky's song?
Any help will be appreciated.
Pavel Greenberg
5)----------------------------------------------------
Date: August 26, 2005
Subject: A question about Africa
Please, can somebody help me, in a question that regards a poem of
Avraham Sutzkever. In one of the poems of the cycle "Helfandn ba
nakht" Sutzkever writes "pigmeyen fun sakhare" I can not understand
what is sakhare as I can't find a town or a region with this name in the
map. Maybe, somebody knows.
Sigrid Sohn
6)----------------------------------------------------
Date: August 26, 2005
Subject: klal-shprakh
I see the value in instructing students using the klal-sprakh non-accented
Yiddish for early study, but after that it becomes a new dialect...the one
one hears Zumer-program graduates nad klez-kamp enthusiasts, many of whom
are now Yiddish college instructors of Yiddish actually speaking with
eachother. It sounds awful to my ears (and I too learned Yiddish from
College Yiddish in an essentially klal-sprakh way, at McGill, from the late
Leib Tencer). At some point, by the second semester or so, students ought
to be exposed to dialectical, i.e. real, Yiddish. This would make learning
the language more interesting. You get to choose if you want to be a Litvak
or a Poylisher or a Galitsianer or an 'Ingerisher. If you keep speaking
klal-shprakh for too long, you're just a Yiddish speaking sheygets.
For additional remarks see
http://www.forward.com/articles/3839
Allan Nadler
7)----------------------------------------------------
Date: August 27, 2005
Subject: Josef Burg, Yiddish writer
Mendele readers will find this article from the Financial Times interesting.
http://news.ft.com/cms/s/6807041c-145d-11da-9df1-00000e2511c8.html
Martin Davis
8)----------------------------------------------------
Date: August 28, 2005
Subject: Shmuel Mett o"h
Our readers everywhere extend their deepest sympathy to fellow-Mendelist
Perets Mett and his wife Judith on the tragic death if their son Shmuel in
Jerusalem.
Shamosim
______________________________________________________
End of Mendele Vol. 15.023
Please do not use the "reply" key when writing to Mendele. Instead, choose
one of these two:
Messages for posting on Mendele
Personal and other messages to the shamosim