Mendele: Yiddish literature and language ____________________________________________________ Contents of Vol. 15.037 December 19, 2005 1) Poems of Anna Margolin (Shirley Kumove) 2) Snobbery in Yiddish Literature (Sam Guncler) 3) megayer zayn (Leizer Gillig) 4) 'faher' (Yaffa Glass) 5) kvetch (Norman Buder) 6) kvetch (Allan Nadler) 7) khattess (Arnold Abramovitz) 8) Early Yiddish Medical Writings (Cheryl Tallan) 1)---------------------------------------------------- Date: December 7 Subject: Poems of Anna Margolin It gives me great pleasure to announce that: _Drunk from the Bitter Truth_ The Poems of Anna Margolin translated, edited and introduced by Shirley Kumove is now available in a bilingual edition, published by SUNY Press, Albany, N.Y. http://www.sunypress.edu/details.asp?id=3D61173 Anna Margolin (1887-1952) settled permanently in New York City in 1913. A brilliant poet, her reputation rests on her volume of poems published in Yiddish in 1929. Although written in the 1920s, Margolin's poetry is remarkably fresh and contemporary, dealing with themes of anxiety, loneliness and the search for artistic and spiritual identity and meaning. Translated here by Shirley Kumove, the poems appear in the original Yiddish and in her careful translations into English. Shirley Kumove's literary and biographical introduction highlights Margolin's tempestuous, unconventional life and her literary achievements. Shirley Kumove 2)---------------------------------------------------- Date: December 8 Subject: Re: Snobbery in Yiddish Literature On the subject of snobbery, Goldfadn's "Di Kaprizne Kale-moyd: oder Kabtsnzohn et Hungerman," ably adapted by The Folksbiene a couple of seasons ago, humorously details what happens when the title character spurns all Yiddish-speaking suitors, preferring a groom who can speak "daytsh." Sam Guncler 3)---------------------------------------------------- Date: December 8 Subject: Re: megayer zayn To respond to Felicitas Payk's inquiries. A female ger is called a giyoires in Yiddish and one says "zi hot zikh megayer geven" i.e. the verbal construction does not change vis-a-vis gender. A female "goy" is sometimes called a "goyte", and sometimes a "goye". That term is often used to refer to the (nonjewish) cleaning lady. It is not pejorative, like "shiksa", which is the feminine form of "sheygetz". We usually had Jewish help in the house, but in the odd case that we had someone who wasn't Jewish, my children were taught to refer to "di goye" as "Mrs. Jackson" and if speaking about Mrs. Jackson, (unless they wanted tsu veren geshmissen) they would not have said "Mrs. Jackson iz a goye"; they would have perhaps said "Mrs Jackson iz nisht keyn yiddishe." (Since "yiddishe" is not a noun, perhaps this is technically incorrect in 'klal-yidish' but that's how we say it.) Regarding the use of Hebrew verbal constructions in general, based on the people with whom I am acquainted, I think that anyone who actually speaks fluent Yiddish as their native language or learned it among religious Jews vs. in an academic setting, and certainly anyone - religious or not - who spoke yiddish as their native language in pre-war Europe will understand the Hebrew expressions used in everyday speech by religious people. Some older people who grew up in America in secular homes may not understand these terms. To clarify: "khasene hobn" means "to get married", "mekadesh zayn" has to do with a specific part of the marriage ceremony when the khosn gives the kale the "kedushin ringl". You wouldn't say "Er hot zi mekadesh geven" if you meant "er hot khasune gehat" - I'm sorry that what I wrote led to confusion. (and furthermore, Ven der chosn is mekadesh di kale; di kale vert mekudeshes; ober di kale is NISHT mekadesh dem khosn. - the traditional Jewish marriage is a one-way deal.) In talmudic times, the "kedushin" part of the marriage took place fully a year before the marriage was consummated under the khupe (nesuyin), so it would be possible when discussing Talmudical topics to say something like "Der chosn hot mekadesh geven di kale a gantz yor eyder zey hobn khasune gehat." Leizer Gillig 4)---------------------------------------------------- Date: December 8 Subject: 'faher' Do you know the word 'Faher'? It was spelled (wrongly I think) in Yiddish fey, hey, reysh. I could not find it in the dictionary but deduce that it just may be a shorter way of saying 'a farheren,' which is a listening (literally)- in this case to a boy Am I right? Please reply as soon as you can, as my son will have one of 'them' next week and it would be nice to know what they are in advance. Yaffa Glass 5)---------------------------------------------------- Date: December 8 Subject: Re: kvetch Faith Jones (December 2, 2005) reports that she "cannot find anywhere in Born To Kvetch where Mr. Wex claims the usage of "kvetsh" to mean complain is anything other than English." Unfortunately, the mere title is enough to spread the falsehood that "kvetsh" does mean complain in Yiddish and that Jews complain inordinately and inveterately. I take with a ton of salt Mr. John V. Burke's claim (December 2, 2005)that his mother and grandmother used "kvetsh" in Yiddish to mean complain. To be frank, I think his mother and grandmother have been deceived by the influence of English. Of course, "farzindikn" in the phrase "nit tsu farzindikn" is cognate with the German word for sin. Norman Buder 6)---------------------------------------------------- Date: December 8 Subject: Re: kvetch While agreeing with Faith Jones' defense of Michael Wex's wonderful book, Born to Kvetch, and adding the suggestion that Leonard Prager might have been wise actually to have read the book before kvetching about it, I take exception to her observation that those reading my own review of Wex "could easily come away with impression that the book is a 300-page tirade against klal-shprakh and those who speak it." In fact, I deal (approvingly) with Wex's criticisms of the klal-shprakh phenomenon in a single paragraph towards the very end of my review, after having discussed, in significantly greater detail, his hilarious discussion of the culture of the kheyder, as but one example of Wex's many humorous, but learned, treatments of his subject. My review's major focus is Wex's fresh approach of tracing the great varieties of Yiddish kvetching back to Biblical and Rabbinic sources and it refers by name to his chapters on both death and sex. That said, I cannot quite undertand why Faith finds it "increasingly bewildering" that the book's appearance has generated yet another round of kvetching and petty in-fighting among the Mendelistn -- a quintessentially Yiddish carnival that I'm delighted to join with this posting. Does not the current exchange just confirm the central thesis, indeed the very title, of Wex's work? Specifically, does it not re-enforce Wex's chartacterization of the Klal-shprakhniks as humorless "strident nudniks?" Therefore, I propose -- contra-Faith Jones' appeal to "please stop bickering" -- that this bickering is proof that the essential spirit of Yiddish, precisely as described by Wex, is still alive. We continue to kvetch, therefore we still are, and that is cause for celebration, not distress. Only when, khas ve-sholem, the bickering and kvetching come to an end, will I begin seriously to worry about the future of Yiddish culture. Allan Nadler 7)---------------------------------------------------- Date: December 7 Subject: khattess There are many terms of opprobrium for gentiles: goy, yok, sheygetz, poyer are some which I believe are known internationally.that seems to be peculiar to South African Yiddish.carefully, I have not yet heard of its being used by non-South African Yiddish speakers.pejorative term applied to a working class Afrikaner.Hebrew is khattat, which I think was a biblical term used to describe the sin to be "transferred" to a scapegoat, after which the beast would somehow "contain" sin loaded into it by human sinners, and hence would itself be (in a sense) an innocent or unknowing or ignorant sinner. Arnold Abramovitz 8)---------------------------------------------------- Date: December 7 Subject: Early Yiddish Medical Writings Thanks all who sent information in reply to my query to this list on this subject a few months ago. Here is info on the published writings on this early Yiddish medical writings: Baumgarten, Jean. 2005. Introduction to Old Yiddish Literature. Ed. and trans. Jerold C. Frakes. Oxford -- New York: Oxford University Press has a section titled "Yiddish Medical Texts (Fourteenth - Eighteenth Centuries), pp. 341-359. Frakes, Jerold C., ed. 2005. Early Yiddish Texts 1100-1750. Oxford - New York: Oxford University Press. Frakes arranges these texts in chronological order, but in the front of the book he classifies them according to genre. On p. xxvi he lists the "Medicine and Magic" texts. Cheryl Tallan _______________________________________________ End of Mendele Vol. 15.037 Please do not use the "reply" key when writing to Mendele. 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