Mendele: Yiddish literature and language ______________________________________________________ Contents of Vol. 5.251 February 12, 1996 1) Englishisms in Yiddish (Ellen Prince) 2) Khasidish or misnagdish (Ellen Cassedy) 3) Khasidish or misnagdish (Eliyahu Juni) 4) The Yiddish canon (Ellen Prince) 5) The Yiddish canon (David Goldberg) 1)---------------------------------------------------- Date: Sun, 11 Feb 1996 15:09:58 EST From: ellen@central.cis.upenn.edu Subject: Englishisms in Yiddish zellig bach proclaims that '[we] must now, before it is too late, put up clear and firm barriers against the flood of Englishisms that threaten to water down and corrupt correct Yiddish.' 1. what does 'our' authority to erect 'barriers' derive from? 2. what is 'correct yiddish' and how did you come to discover it? 3. how much exactly do you think the contemporary yiddish speech community will obey our 'barriers'? inquiring minds want to know... ellen prince 2)---------------------------------------------------- Date: Sun, 11 Feb 1996 22:17:40 -0500 From: cassblum@aol.com Subject: Khasidish or misnagid Has anyone else noticed the similarity between "Der rebbe elimeylech" and "Old King Cole"? Merry old soul, fiddlers three,etc. Ellen Cassedy Bethesda, MD 3)---------------------------------------------------- Date: Mon, 12 Feb 1996 01:41:14 -0500 From: e.juni@utoronto.ca Subject: Khsidim and misnagdim Koydem kol, miz ikh ets beytn mkhile, az ikh bin nisht g'veyn du in ikh honisht ontayl g'nimn in Mendele di letste pur vokhn. Ikh hom'kh iberg'tsoygn fin Tronte ts'Nu York, ts'lernen in Yeshive Universite of ayn semester; khbin geveyn zayer farnimen derfar. Ikh hob a gantse g'nize fin Mendele, in ikh hof iberts'kiken als vus ikh hob avekg'laykt in'm ven ikh'l hubn mer tsyat; dervaal, vel ikh mikh mishn in hayntige inyunim. Khiil toykhaz yoyshvey ploshes ;-}. Reb Hershl Hartman and Reb Anno Siegel wrote (v. 5.248) about misnagdishe songs which satirize khsidim (in reply to a post by Reb Zellig Bach in v. 5.246). Hershl said he "always understood that almost _all_ Yiddish folksongs that refer to the rebe and/or his khsidim/khsidimlakh are misnagdish satires of khasidism," and asked to hear from our musicologists, one of whom I am not. But what I can attest to is that although I know quite a few Yiddish songs used in the contemporary Yiddish-speaking khsidishe community, none of them refer to a rebbe or to khsidim. (I don't know of any Yiddish songs used in the non-khsidishe chareidi community, and even by the khsidim, they're not as common as they once were.) Anno brought up two specific songs (in addition to the one under discussion, "sha shtil"): "un az der rebbe zingt", and "un az der rebe elimeylekh". I recently had a short exchange with Reb Noyekh about these songs, though I did not bring it up on Mendele. What follows is what I said, and one detail that I remember from his response. Long ago, my father taught me "un az der rebbe zingt" under the title "un az der rebe tantst", and said it was a maskilishe (not misnagdishe) parody of khsidim. He had a final stanza in which the verb was replaced with the phoneme "ah" (un az der rebe ah!), which was supposed to be the height of the parody--if the rebe expresses wonder, the khsidim will too, without thinking. I'm not sure, but I think some of the verbs were not exactly the same for the rebe and the khsidim--un az der rebe est, fresn ale khsidim (possibly implying that khsidim use their rebe as a justification for behaving boorishly or improperly). The second song, "Un az der rebe Elimeylekh", I learned from secular sources. I am convinced that it is not of khsidishe origin, for a number of reasons. The strongest is that the rebe in question, Reb Elimeylekh of Lizhensk, is never referred to by his full name among khsidim--he is always called "der rebe Reb Maylekh" (even among khsidim who would normally pronounce it "Meylekh"), or by the title of his seyfer, "der noyam elimeylekh." (This could be explained away by the requirements of rhyme and meter, but I don't think that's what's going on.) Another reason, though not as strong, is that der rebe reb Maylekh is one of the most important giants of khsides, and is spoken of in only the most reverent of terms--only the Besh"t is treated much more reverently--and I can't imagine someone khsidish writing a song about him which portrayed him as even semi-human. His brother, der rebe reb Zishe of Anipoli, who was much more folksy and down-to-earth, would have been a more likely candidate. And the song has always struck me as irreverent--it reminds me of the nursery rhyme about old King Cole. If I recall correctly, Reb Noyekh replied to me that he didn't perceive the song as irreverent at all, and that it seemed to him to be showing the rebbe as being human, not some removed mystic vus fliit in him'l. (Did I get that right? Please correct me if not.) Anno said something similar. I can hear the tayne, but I think Reb Maylekh is the wrong address for it. The only way I could see it would be if it was written by non-khsidim who were not intending to mock, and picked a famous rebbe without realizing that they were picking the wrong one for the image they wanted. Eliyahu Juni 4)---------------------------------------------------- Date: Sun, 11 Feb 1996 23:22:20 EST From: ellen@central.cis.upenn.edu Subject: The Yiddish canon meyer wolf, what a list! question: are any of those already in electronic form? (i mean the modern stuff -- i know lots of the old stuff is.) as i think i've mentioned, beatrice santorini and i have (laboriously) gotten two works into electronic form, olsvanger's _royte pomerantsn_ and hirshbeyn's _grine felder_. i know they're not on your list but, if you'd like them for the collective effort, just say the word. and we'd both be _very_ grateful for new stuff! ellen prince 5)---------------------------------------------------- Date: Mon, 12 Feb 96 09:41:46 EST From: david.goldberg@smtpgwy.mla.org Subject: The Yiddish canon Meyer Wolf's preliminary list towards describing a Yiddish canon reminds me that there was another list that the early editors of the Groyser Verterbukh prepared which Mendelyaner might find interesting. The list included about 2600 books (including journals, collections, multi volumed complete works) from which citations were drawn in the Verterbukh. I've lost track of the list since the time that I worked for the Verterbukh, but it gave a great sense of the breadth of the literature (as well as some specialized, authentic but non literary sides of the language, such as technical manuals and professional publications like _Der yidisher farmer_) rather than just pointing out the high spots. Efforts to delimit the canon take the chance of missing important voices. Meyer, do you know what happened to the files from the Verterbukh's bibliography project? David Goldberg ______________________________________________________ End of Mendele Vol. 5.251 Mendele has 2 rules: 1. Provide a meaningful Subject: line 2. Sign your article (full name please) Send articles to: mendele@yalevm.ycc.yale.edu Send change-of-status messages to: listserv@yalevm.ycc.yale.edu a. For a temporary stop: set mendele nomail b. To resume delivery: set mendele mail c. To subscribe: sub mendele first_name last_name d. To unsubscribe kholile: unsub mendele Other business: nmiller@mail.trincoll.edu ****Getting back issues**** 1. Anonymous ftp archives are available. ftp ftp.mendele.trincoll.edu in the directory pub/mendele/files A table of contents is also available, along with weekly updates. 2. Mendele archives can also be reached as follows: via WWW: http://sunsite.unc.edu/yiddish/mewais.html via gopher: gopher://sunsite.unc.edu/11/../.pub/academic/languages/yiddish/mendele via ftp: ftp://sunsite.unc.edu/pub/academic/languages/yiddish/mendele