מענדעלע

Tayere Mendelistn,

Have patience! The great _davenen_ and etymology controversies should not be cause for discomfort. One of us even wrote that this is not what Mendele is all about. I beg to differ. Mendele is our forum. It can certainly accommodate all our concerns, for the Internet is a very large place indeed. For those who want to see more Yiddish literature: Please, write! And my suggestion to those who have tired of the _davenen_ debates is that they simply not read them. It's OK not to read something. You can even get a pro-rated refund on your subscription!

I myself have immensely enjoyed the raging polemics (and imagine how much more so had I actually read them). I continually remind myself, however, that I can't read everything, that I have to treat my subscription as a means of insuring that I will always see what's being discussed. Then I can pick and choose, as time and interest permit.

As for the issues of folk etymologies, amateur linguistics, dictionaries, and Morality, they have all but merged with the particulars of the _davenen_ debate and seem to me they should be treated of a piece. While I agree with the position that informed, methodologically disciplined inquiry is essential if we are to develop anything approaching reliable explanations for some of these mysteries, I don't share the view that uninformed, methodologically undisciplined observation has no place on Mendele. What ought to be clear is that uninformed, methodologically undisciplined observation is traditional! It is a part of Yiddish culture, no less than the parallel tradition of great learning. As such, it is the mere fact of this stuff's existence, this half-baked oral pseudo-learning, and of the passionate concern for it, that is so interesting. To exclude it because it cannot be supported by linguistic science or because it is not in a dictionary distorts the reality of the culture.

Mendele is not, and cannot, be authoritative. It is an ongoing discussion. It really doesn't matter if someone raises a question they could have looked up, or if someone asserts as true something that is not -- which does not mean it is not important for others to challenge the wrong information. It just means it is not a moral transgression. The reason scholars footnote sources is to render their assertions open to verification. So it goes with all inquiry. It is all always open.

As for my claim that uninformed inquiry is part of our Yiddish culture, if some of the charming claims and concerns we read on Mendele are not evidence enough, I would submit the case of Tevye, one of whose principal character traits is to engage in monologic flights of hopelessly bungled erudition. Much of what is so wonderful about his character and literary persona lies in these mangled quotes from rabbinic literature, of course, and in the inspired malapropisms themselves. But there must be a deeper parody in his epic development as well, one that satirizes the culture at large. Tevye could not have been so successful had he not been also engaging an element present in the Yiddish world(s) of his time. Though certainly fictional, it would not have been so funny -- and so endearing -- had the reader not found something recognizable about Tevye's modus operandi, something that rang familiar.

We have all known arrogant blowhards, and at the same time we have all known well-meaning but misinformed, even naively innocent, do-gooders, well-wishers, and sundry other kibitsers. The range is wide, and our tolerances vary. What they all share, however, all these opinionated fabulists and fabricators, is a passion to have the opinions, which, admittedly, may range from useless to offensive. But can you imagine a world of Yiddish literature without them? Can you conceive of a Yiddish life where such opinions are not offered, not just impetuously, but as though a matter of life and death? Can you imagine, in other words, the opinions not being about the language itself?

Ron Robboy

If L. Fridlander is so unhappy with Nomberg's Germanicized style, which he considers "stiff," then he should be happy that I translated it into a non-Germanicized English. Is he implying that my translation of the story reads better than the original? Thank you for the compliment. I'm always gratified to hear from my fans.

In regard to his complaint about sliding off into a discussion of German words on Mendele: he's quite right. However, he was the one who slid into German when he brought up "vidrik" after failing to find the correct meaning in an inadequate German dictionary. He also seems to have missed a few points, which I don't want to go into again. He should, however, check a German etymological dictionary to see that the German adjective "widrig," as I've already explained, has nothing to do with the German noun "Widder" (ram). But I've already gone into that in a previous posting. If L. Fridhandler wishes to abandon the discussion of German borrowings in Nomberg, why does he keep bringing them up?

I also find any sweeping rejection of Germanisms in Yiddish literature rather useless. They have specific functions, as I've already explained in a previous posting--and one of those functions is to help create a Yiddish modernism. But let that be for now.

Joachim Neugroschel

The recent postings concerning the style of Nomberg's "tsvishn berg" have made me want to write something concerning "daytshmerish."

1) It seems to me that daytshmerish is sometimes used to refer to a style considered inauthentic in Yiddish.

2) Now if you're me, and you use a Germanic turn of phrase because your Yiddish has given out in mid-sentence, and all you can think of is the German word or idiom, then what you're producing is in fact both daytshmerish and inauthentic.

3) But when I read earlier Yiddish literature - _not_ Sholem Aleikhem, but say, works as diverse as Yente Serdatski's "Vide" (printed in _Bridges_ some years back), Ruvn Ayzland's memoir of Anna Margolin in _Fund Undzer Friling_, Margolin's own poems - I encounter a lot of traits that one might call daytshmerish. Clearly in these cases the writing is not inauthentic.

4) So where, exactly, does the sense come from that daytshmerish is in se inauthentic? (I've wondered whether it's come to seem more inauthentic - or something worse than that - because of an association linking daytshmerish, daytsh, and Nazi Germany.)

I'd be grateful to hear some discussion of this - a sheynem dank,

Larry Rosenwald

Excuse me for exploiting Mendele on a marginally-if-at-all-but-probably-nonYiddish word, but as a Canadian, I bristled when I read Dan Gilman's designation of "kay-bosh" rather than "k'bosh" as a "strange English-language mutilation of the printed word." Here in Canada, as in England, we pronounce it kay-bosh. And thus it is pronounced in the World War 1 song: "Belgium Put the Kaibosh on the Kaiser," which can be heard on the original cast recording from the musical "Oh! What a Lovely War."

You Americans always mess up with spelling and pronounciation!

Genug shoyn mit kaybosh. S'iz nisht keyn yidishn vort. Davenen, for all its trials and tribulations, is, whatever its origin.

Itsik Goldenberg

What is the group's opinion of the English-Yiddish Encyclopedic Dictionary by Paul Abelson (New York, 1924 ~1750 pages) I keep hearing about Harkavy's, Stutshkov's, and Weinreich's dictionaries and not about this monumental work; why? Yes, it goes only one way, but with some effort you can find the meaning!

Gilad J. Gevaryahu

Nusen Fishman asks (07.121) about the expression "b'lo kharote u'blo d'ro'o". Not being a linguist put me at a disadvatage in this mekhubedike group, but I'll try.

Since the context is: " Before beginning the game, one says to his brother, benni: "eyn zakh vil ikh dir beten, benni, - b'lo kharote u'blo d'ro'o, - dos heyst: a gang zol zayn a gang."; it suggests that he tells his brother "do not play with tricks".

"Kharote" from Hebrew 'kharatah', in this contest means 'with no going back', so the second "d'ro'o" is likely to be from Aramaic "dera'ah" (Jastrow p.324) 'arm-hand' equivalent to Hebrew 'zeroah' and in this context probably means "without armtwisting", or 'without improper handling'. However, I never so it or heard it used that way in Yiddish - this is a mere speculation on my part.

Gilad J. Gevaryahu

Nusen Fishman asked about the meaning of "b'lo kharote u'blo d'ro'o" in Sholem Aleikhem's "Khanuke gelt" [07.121]. This phrase is likely a laconic formula for two of the major rules of chess (that also apply to the checkers). It may have originated from Rashi, the first European who mentioned chess in his writings, or from Ibn Ezra, whose song "Haruzim al sehok shah-mat" contains the first comprehensive treatise of the rules of the game in Europe.

The rules changed very insignificantly since Ibn Ezra's times, and translated by the modern-day lawyers, "b'lo kharote u'blo d'ro'o" becomes: "4.3. Except as provided in Article 4.2, if the player having the move deliberately touches on the chessboard: (a) one or more pieces of the same colour, he must move or capture the first piece touched that can be moved or captured... 4.7. When, as a legal move or part of a legal move, a piece has been released on a square, it cannot then be moved to another square." (FIDE Laws of Chess, 1996) The difference in size between the original and translation is understandable, taking into account that Ibn Ezra was not paid by hour. More popularly, the rules are known as "touch move" and "don't take move back".

For more details see: "Shokh shpil: do vert gelernt vi azoy me zol kenin shpilen in den barimter shpil - shokh", Zhitomir: A. Sh. Shadov, 1869, however it might be out of print.

Iosif Vaisman Chapel Hill

Dobrushin (1883-1953) was born in Chernigov, the son of a lumber merchant. After studying at the Sorbonne in the early 1900s, he returned to Russia and , in 1916, helped found the Kiev Kultur-Lige along with Peretz Markish and others. The Kultur-Lige was one of the first avant-garde Jewish literary and artistic circles in Russia which eventually spawned music, literature, art and theater sections. It was disbanded in 1924. In 1920 Dobrushin moved to Moscow where he became secretary of the Yiddish Writers Union. Throughout the 1920s and 1930s, Dobrushin became known as one of the most prolific Yiddish literary critics and dramatists of the era. He was a regular contributor to the Communist newspaper, Der Emes. Dobrushin was also very involved with the Soviet Yiddish State Theater, and served as one of its literary directors and a teacher at the Yiddish theater school. His numerous published works on Soviet Yiddish theater include biographies of Mikhoels, Benjamin Zuskin and a work on Children's Theater. Dobrushin was also the most prolific Yiddish playwright of the era, although only two of his plays, The Court is in Session (Der Gerikht Geyt) and The Specialist (which he wrote with Isaac Nusinov) were ever actually performed (at the Moscow State Yiddish Theater in 1929 and 1932 respectively). His other plays included Fire God and On the 82nd Strip of Land. Dobrushin's most productive work as a dramatist was in his adaptations of others' plays. He adapted Goldfadn's Sorceress and Tenth Commandment; A. Vayter's Before Sunrise; Mendele Moykher Sforim's Travels of Benjamin III; and Sholem Aleichem's Luftmentshen and Tevye the Dairyman, among others. In the late 1930s, Dobrushin collaborated with A. Yuditskii to compile a collection of Yiddish folk songs, which included both traditional songs and contemporary Soviet songs. During World War II, Dobrushin was a member of the Jewish Anti-fascist Committee and a regular contributor to its newspaper, Aynikayt. He was arrested in 1949 and perished in the gulag, presumably in 1953.

Jeffrey Veidlinger

Dear Mendele,

If they call the "@" symbol a "shtrudel" in Hebrew, what is the proper term in Yiddish? Enquiring minds need to know!

Lynda Kraar