Mendele: Yiddish literature and language ______________________________________________________ Contents of Vol. 5.220 January 18, 1996 1) Apostrophes (Rick Gildemeister) 2) Dov Noy lectures at Stanford (Cecile Kuznitz) 3) Haredi Yiddish (Miriam Isaacs) 4) Haredi Yiddish and Rav Shakh (Bob Hoberman) 5) Redn tsum reboyne-shel-oylem (Shleyme Axelrod) 1)---------------------------------------------------- Date: Tue, 16 Jan 96 16:05:53 EST From: eeglc%cunyvm.bitnet@yalevm.cis.yale.edu Subject: Apostrophes I'm coming in rather late in this discussion as my job has been demanding most of my concentration and I haven't had the chance to give a lot of energy to other things, like our beloved Mendele. I agree with Marion Aptroot and Zellig Bach about possibly getting into all sorts of internal punctuation styles, which have more to do with the wants of English-speakers. When I was a serials cataloger at NYU, I dealt with a lot of Yiddish newspapers and periodicals that were very daytshmerized, and I found quite often that an apostrophe would be added when a Hebraic stem was connected to Germanic prefixes and suffixes. I don't see much of this at all anymore, but I do seem to remember seeing it in the Forverts, which preserved a lot of those old spelling conventions (e.g. Id, idish). Just a word about "Alsatian". A Yiddish scholar, a guter khaver mayner, went to Alsace, and learned some Alsatian Yiddish from the old people that were left. I don't know how true this is, but he said the Marx brothers' parents were from Alsace, and the nonsense title of one of their movies, "Duck Soup" comes from an Alsatian Yiddish exclamation "Dukh zuuuu". I don't claim any expertise in that particular dialect, so caveat emptor. I've seen specimens of Southwest Yiddish, and I've always been amazed at the lack of interference by the local Gentile patois. Alemannisch (hope I spelled that right) is very rough going, and the Yiddish spoken there would be easier for a German Gentile from points further North to understand. A grus aykh alemen! Rick Gildemeister 2)---------------------------------------------------- Date: Tue, 16 Jan 1996 18:10:49 -0800 (PST) From: tsirl@leland.stanford.edu Subject: Dov Noy lectures at Stanford As requested of me by one mendelyaner, I am providing a brief report on the Yiddish lectures given by Prof. Dov Noy at Stanford University on January 10-11. Prof. Noy spoke twice, the first evening in English on "Time and Space in Jewish Folklore." Bekitser, his thesis was that in Jewish folklore, in contrast to non-Jewish folklores, time is more important than space. Only in Jewish folklore do we see an orientation towards the future, for example. In his second lecture, given in Yiddish, Prof. Noy spoke about the process of folklorization, by which songs with known authors become folksongs. He defined a folksong as a song that is commonly sung and adapted by a "folk" or "oylem" that may be unaware of the composition's author. (I am writing these summaries af eyn fus so they of course do not do justice to the scope of the lectures.) Both talks were interspersed with examples of folktales and folksongs which made them especially lively and entertaining for the audience. Cecile Kuznitz 3)---------------------------------------------------- Date: Wed, 17 Jan 1996 16:51:34 -0500 (EST) From: miriamis@gwis2.circ.gwu.edu Subject: Haredi Yiddish Nokh an entfer far Steven Jacobson vegn Yidish bay haredim. er hot geshtelt a vikhtige frage in ikh entfer es oyf Yidish es nokh zekh nokh a bisl tsaplen lebedigerhayt. Vegn tsaytungen bay khsidim, iz nisht a bavayz az di shprakh halt on. Men ken nayes bakimen bay andere mitlen oder nisht. Ikh hob es geforsht. Dos iz az ikh hob dervayl nisht gefinen kayn tsaytungen bay zey oyf Yidish vos zenen gedrikt in Isrol. Ober ikh veys az in tsaytung gesheftn in Mea Shearim and andere erter vi haredim voynen gefint men a sakh fin di farshidene haredishe tsaytungen- vos zenen gedrikt in Brooklyn. S'iz ersht aroys a nay monatlekh - epes nayes far di Gerer in Lubavitsher oyf Ivrit nor ikh bin nisht zikher vayl ikh hob es nisht gezen. Oykh far "froyen" un far di eltere gefint men di "Yidishe Likht un Yidishe Shtrahl". Es oykh zenen do shules far meydlekh oyf Yidish in avade Loshn Koydesh. Nor di kinderlekh redn Yidish in hoyf un oykh in klas. Ale khsidim itst redn Ivrit in Isrol denk ikh nor a sakh redn in nitsn Yidish tog teglikh- in afile 'may dialekt". Miriam Isaacs 4)---------------------------------------------------- Date: Wed, 17 Jan 1996 13:47:34 -0500 (EST) From: rdhoberman@ccmail.sunysb.edu Subject: Haredi Yiddish and Rav Shakh If anyone is interested, I'll listen to my tape of Rav Shakh's speech and let you know more about his language. Bob Hoberman 5)---------------------------------------------------- Date: Wed, 17 Jan 1996 13:33:49 -0500 (EST) From: ptyaxel@ubvms.cc.buffalo.edu Subject: Redn tsum reboyne-shel-oylem Interestingly, Vol. 5.218 includes both a poem (by Marty Ross, transmitted by Bert Steinberg) in which the speaker is skeptical about the meaning of praying to God, and an inquiry from Sylvan Zavi Beer about a poem in which God is asked when the promise of making the Jews like the stars in the sky will be fulfilled, they having already been made like the dust of the earth. The poem Sylvan is looking for is Shimen Frug's (1860-1916) _Zamd un shtern_, which has been anthologized in several collections. Here it is as it appears in Uriel Weinreich's _College Yiddish_, followed by my decidedly unpoetic literal translation. Zamd un Shtern by Shimen Frug Es shaynt di levone, es glantsn di shtern; Di nakht shvebt oyf barg un oyf tol. Dos altitshke bikhele ligt far mir ofn, Ikh leyen es, leyen es toyznter mol. Ikh leyen di heylike, tayere verter; Mir hert zikh a shtime: "Ikh shver, Mayn folk, du vest zayn vi di shtern in himl, Vi zamd oyfn breg funem mer!" Reboyne-shel-oylem! Es vert nit farfaln Fun dayne havtokhes keyn eyn eyntsik vort; Mekuyem muz vern dayn heyliker viln, Alts kumt in zayn tsayt, oyf zayn ort. Un eyns iz shoyn take mekuyem gevorn-- Dos fil ikh, dos veys ikh gevis: Mir zaynen gevorn vi zamd vos is hefker, Vos yederer tret mit di fis... Yo, gotenyu, emes, vi zamd un vi shteyner, Tseshpreyt un tsevorfn oyf shand un oyf shpot... Nu, ober di shtern di likhtike, klore-- Di shtern, di shtern, vu zaynen zey, got? ============================================================ Sand and Stars The moon is shining, the stars are glistening; Night floats on mountain and on valley. The dear old book lies open before me, I read it, read it thousands of times. I read the holy, dear words: I hear a voice: "I swear, My people, you will be like the stars in heaven, Like sand on the shore of the sea!" Lord of the world! Not one single word Of your promises ever is lost: Your holy will must be done, Everything comes in its time, in its place. And one thing has already come to pass-- I feel it, I know it for certain: We have become like stray sand, That everyone tramples underfoot... Yes, dear God, truly, like sand and like stones, Dispersed and scattered in disgrace and humiliation... Well, but the bright, clear stars-- The stars, the stars, where are they, God? Shleyme Axelrod Buffalo, New York [Norman Rosenblatt also replied to the inquiry. nm] ______________________________________________________ End of Mendele Vol. 5.220