[Mendele] Mendele Vol. 19.016
Victor Bers
victor.bers at yale.edu
Fri Dec 11 07:38:46 EST 2009
Mendele: Yiddish literature and language
____________________________________________________
Contents of Vol. 19.016
December 8, 2009
1) song identification sought (Avraham Yehoshua Kahana)
2) serpnzaytik (Denise Braunschweig)
3) Yehupets (Les Train)
4) petsha (Jules Rabin)
5) folktale sought (Lisa Anchin)
6) "The Tempest in Yiddish" (Rebecca Joy Fletcher)
7) "Uncle Joe" (Rebecca Joy Fletcher)
8) kibber (Victoria Lunzer-Talos)
9) shvartser (Eli Rosenblatt)
10) Laurence Olivier and Yiddish (Zevi Ghivelder)
1)----------------------------------------------------
Date: November 30, 2009
Subject: song identification sought
Hello all,
I would highly appreciate if anyone could figure out which song this is.
The following words I managed to poorly transliterate from a video excerpt
where my great uncle gives his testimony to the USC Shoah Institute. He
says he will sing a bit of a song his father used to sing (at Shabbat or
during Pesach?), which talks about missing a city called "Slutsk" (this
is how I understood the name of the city):
mayn tate beyn feygblenken
fin/fem dem mentshn
un zmiros fleygte zingen azoy sheyn*
Thank you in advance,
Avraham Yehoshua Kahana
2)----------------------------------------------------
Date: November 19, 2009
Subject: serpnzaytik
In a poem of Rochel Korn she wrote, "serpnzaytik klor." I looked the word
up and found that "der serp," means the sickle. So, does this mean, that
something gets sharply clear?
Thank you for help and suggestions
Denise Braunschweig
3)----------------------------------------------------
Date: November 28, 2009
Subject: Yehupets
The supposed etymology of the (fictitious) place name Yehupets was first
dealt with in August 1993, when Z. Baker cites Petrovsky's hypothesis
that it might come from the Ukrainian Yehipet (Egypt). However, after
reading T. Schrire's "Hebrew Magic Amulets their Decipherment and
Interpretation," and taking into account the popularity of
amulets (kameas) by Hasidic Jews, I wonder: might the name be a variant of
one of the midrashic shemoth (holy names of God) that appear regularly on
amulets?
Since the four- letter name of God (tetragrammaton) is so holy, writing it
out is not permitted on amulets. Thus, the mekubalim and kabbalists came
up with elaborate and substituted names, and these are in common use on
amulets. The first three letters (assuming that the name is "originally"
spelled according to Hebrew orthography) are the first three letters of
the tetragrammaton (4-letter name of God) and the last two letters - peh
and tsade - are another vov and heh, and are found in shemoth such as
mem-tsade-peh-tsade - a form of the tetragrammaton wherein letters are
substituted according to the "atbash" code, where aleph is substituted for
the last letter of the hebrew alef-beys, beys is substituted for the
second last letter "shin," etc. Shemoth such as Patspatsia (atbash:
vov-heh-vov-heh-yud-heh) and Tsaftsafia (atbash: heh-vov-heh-vov-yud-heh)
are "some of the commoner shemoth which appear most frequently" (page
112); in both, there is the peh-tsade combination duplicated. Therefore,
in Yehupets we might find Sholem Aleichem poking fun (gently) at the whole
concept of amulets!
For historical context, since the spread of Hassidism - and mysticism -
after the Baal Shem Tov (late 18th century), not only Hasidim but "even
among this sturdily rational group (the misnagdim), amulets were in
regular but concealed use in childbed and in times of personal troubles
and difficulty" (page 40).
If anyone has any comments, or wants to "zogn mevines" about the whole
inyen, I'd be glad to hear.
Les Train
4)----------------------------------------------------
Date: November 27, 2009
Subject: petsha
On the trail of the petsha of my boyhood, I have an uncertain memory of a
word something like "shmeyelen" (accent on the first syllable) that might
have referred to the process of burning off the hair covering of a severed
cow's leg.
Does anyone have an accurate idea of the meaning of "shmeyelen" - if the
word isn't a figment of mistaken memory?
A friend has suggested that I might have mistaken "shmeltsn" ("to melt")
for "shmeyelen," but I don't think so. The words sound too different from
each other; and I
think that the meaning of "shmeltsn," "to melt," is too distant from what
I remember the reference of the mystery word to have been: the burning off
of animal hair.
More history: on the 8 or 10 occasions I can remember, when my mother made
petsha, which we all relished, she began with the hairless leg-bones,
sawed at the local butcher shop into trim cookable pieces. My father once
-- only -- brought home a pair of intact legs, with their hair-covering
and hooves intact. With fire and, I suppose, axe, he converted the legs
into a set of pot-ready petsha bones, which my mother cooked up in the
usual way. A couple of weeks ago I acquired from a neighbor a set of 4
calf/cow legs myself, with their original hair and hooves, and retracing
my father's method with fire ("shmeyehlen") and axe, and my mother's
handling of the cookpot, produced a good petsha.
Jules Rabin
5)----------------------------------------------------
Date: November 22, 2009
Subject: folktale sought
I study Yiddish folktales and am looking for a specific story in the
original Yiddish. The story is about a poor old woman who finds a ball of
yarn in the woods and uses it to knit herself all kinds of items -
clothing, of course, but also a little sheep and a mouse and a cat. In the
story, the old woman thinks to slaughter the sheep and cook it, but her
pillow hears her thought. Because everything is made from the same ball of
yarn, the pillow tells her hat, which tells the mouse, who tells the cat,
who tells the sheep. In the end, when the old woman goes to slaughter the
sheep, the sheep is ready and runs away. However, the old woman catches it
by the tail and pulls, which unravels the sheep and then the cat and the
mouse... down the line... until everything comes unraveled including the
old woman.
I was only told about the story. I haven't even seen it printed in
English and am entirely unable to find the original Yiddish. Has anyone
heard of the story? Seen it printed? Know of an author? Or a collection
perhaps? Any clues would be extremely helpful!
Thanks!
Lisa Anchin
6)----------------------------------------------------
Date: December 8, 2009
Subject: "The Tempest" in Yiddish
Friends:
I am seeking a line from Shakespeare's "The Tempest" in Yiddish. Does
anyone have a Yiddish verse translation of "The Tempest"? If yes, could
you possibly provide me with the following line: "We are the stuff that
dreams are made of and our little lives are rounded with a sleep." It
would be most appreciated. It is from the early part of Act Four of the
play.
With thanks,
Rebecca Joy Fletcher
7)----------------------------------------------------
Date: December 8, 2009
Subject: "Uncle Joe"
Friends:
I have read that Marshall Pilsudski, president of Poland from 1926-1935,
was named "Uncle Joe" by many Polish Jews. I am surprised by the
similarity - in English at least - to Stalin's nickname given him by
Roosevelt. I am wondering first off if that nickname for Pilsudski was
used in Yiddish or in Polish? If it appeared in Yiddish, what was the
exact wording? Was the name used "Yosl"? And has anything been written
on the strange similarity between Pilsudksi and Stalin's nicknames?
I welcome any feedback you may have.
With thanks,
Rebecca Joy Fletcher
8)----------------------------------------------------
Date: November 17, 2009
Subject: kibber
Dear Mendelyaners,
In transcribing letters from Joseph Roth, we came across of him ending a
letter (about him needing money) with the words
"Dein alter sehr trauriger Kibber betropezter".
"Betropezter" is no problem, but we are completely at loss with
"kibber."Can anyone of you help us?
Roth was Austrian author born in 1894 and raised in Brody/Galicia. Later,
he was a (very successful) journalist in Vienna, Berlin, and Frankfurt.
Roth grew up speaking German in the family, plus had a sound knowledge of
Polish, Yiddish, even Russian.
The letter is written in German, and Roth was of course fluent in the
"Yiddishisms" generally used in Vienna as well as in the journalistic
"Rotwelsch."
Thank you very much!
Victoria Lunzer-Talos
9)----------------------------------------------------
Date: November 10, 2008
Subject: shvartser
A guter morgn oyf aykh un oyf kol yisroel!
I have a question about the etymology of the Yiddish term "Neger," which
is used often in Yiddish literature to mean, according to Weinreich,
"Negro." Apologetically,
Weinreich translates "shvartser" as "black man" and I always understood
"shvartser" to be the Yiddish translation of the n-word! However, because
"neger" sounds so close to
the racist "nigger" in American English, I am wondering if there is any
consensus on the etymology and precise meanings of the term, since it is
used primarily in
American Yiddish literature. Was there any discussion about the this type
of terminology and its social implications?
Eli Rosenblatt
10)----------------------------------------------------
Date: November 19, 2009
Subject: Laurence Olivier and Yiddish
In Neil Diamond's version of "The Jazz Singer," the part of the rabbi is
played by Laurence Olivier, who speaks a few lines in Yiddish better than
any Jew.
Zevi Ghivelder
________________________________________________________
End of Mendele Vol. 19.016
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