מענדעלע

Khaver Engle zikht a pur 'shtarke' verter in Yidish, un ikh hob moyre... khotsh men lost zikh arayn in sheltn....

Nu, zol es take nemen a _kholerie_, un a shvartze kholerie oykhet, az es du a tzol vertlekh, un avade shelt vertlekh:

'a shvartze mapule' 'oysgerisen/farbrent zol er/zi vern' Zol trefn:'a miese m'shine'; 'a make' By the way, an animal does not die (shtarb), se 'peygert'...."Mayn ferd hot 'gepeygert'...The word has been used in other (un-nice ways)...

Men ken oykhet farmakhn dem pisk (crude for: shut your mouth); Di markziters dortn in di alte tzaytn hobn di verter gekent gantz gut, un es iz take gegangen vi vaser...(The market women in the old days knew the crude words quite well, and they really flowed like water)

Other Mendlyaners may want to translate...or have other choice ones.

Does anyone remember: hinyekes fun gepeygerte ferd??? That may be what this little post is worth!! And there are also some choice Polish/Goyish/Russian words...

Mendy Fliegler.

Having been unable to read Mendele postings in recent weeks, we are unaware if our note and poems we printed by Dovid Greenberg in our column "Perl fun der yidisher poezye" were acknowledged in Mendele. This was in response to a grandson's query about his grandfather's biography. If not, let us inform that such an item appeared in the Sept. l2th issue of the Forverts. Azoy vi mir hobn nit gezen di mendele-post zint etlekhe vokhn, veysn mir nit tsi undzer notits vegn Dovid Grinberg oder Dovid Ben Yishay iz geven fartseykhnt - vi a tshuve tsu zayn eynikls onfreg tsu di mendelyaner. Oyb nit, viln mir moydie zayn, az mir hobn gedrukt di biografye un a lid fun dem dikhter in undzer rubrik "Perl fun der yidisher poezye" in Forverts fun 21tn september.

Chana un Yosl Mlotek.

This is a follow-up to Hugh Denman's response to John Patten's query re Anarchism in Yiddish. There was an anarchist colony in New Jersey called Stelton, whose papers are at Rutgers University, Special Collection. These anarchists, almost all Russian Jewish immigrants, did not want to be identified necessarily as Jewish, but their main publication was Der Frey Arbiter Shtimme, edited by Sam Freedman, who also lived in Stelton.. It was a completely Yiddish publication, the only language its subscribers could read. Its pages are full of Anarchist ideology and news of the American anarchist colonies, which, like Stelton, had many Jewish members. Stelton deserves a book, in case someone is looking for a topic.

Gertrude Dubrovsky

Song lyrics time again! Ever since I read that the great composer Sholem Secunda refused to accept George Gershwin as an assistant, I've felt Jewish music potentially lost many jazz influenced classic songs. Still, many of Gershwin's tunes sound, to me, to have that 'Yiddishe tam', especially the minor key ones.

Since Yiddish words have been written for The Anniversary Song, then maybe it would be as fitting to have some of Gershwin's melodies similarly treated. For instance, Sefra Burstin from Melbourne has described an Australian summer in her original words for Gershwin's Summertime:

Zumer teg, s'brent di zun vi a fayer Aza veter, me ken oysgeyn fun hits Khotsh s'iz 'dushne' iz es nokh a mekhaye Zikh tsu vayln farbrent un farshvitst

I'd love to know a second verse, or any other singable Yiddish words to this tune, whether translations of the original English text or not.

Freyndlekhe Grisn fun 'den undeh'

David Krycer

An acquaintance (parents of kids in our kids' school) was recently in Israel and returned with a message for us: they met a Dr. M. Reznikoff, who (in their words) "promotes Yiddish worldwide", and he was interested in hearing from us (given that we're raising our kids in Yiddish).

I have neither the time nor inclination to start new paper-mail correspondence at present, but perhaps someone knows Dr. Reznikoff? If he's interested in our family, he'd no doubt be interested in everything going on on MENDELE, not to mention Yugntruf and its activities. (Speaking of which, Yugntruf's annual yidish-vokh, which just finished Sept. 2, was wonderful as usual.) Then again, maybe he's on MENDELE already; the name is vaguely familiar.

David Sherman Toronto

Mendele's website, http://www2.trincoll.edu/~mendele is now considerably enlarged from what it was at its inception. It now includes links to the most recent issues as well as all of Volume 7. The contents of Volumes 1 through 6 are also available and links to _all_ individual issues will be installed over time.

Other additions will be showing up in the near future. Suggestions and comments are welcome.

As before, warm thanks to Iosif Vaisman, Victor Bers and Leonard Prager for their help and encouragement. And a special thanks to Paul Miller, who has been particularly helpful to his html-phobic father.

Noyekh Niller

Remember the frustration when you were looking last time for that elusive Swahili-Yiddish or Yiddish-Basque phrasebook? Young Berkeley physicist Michael Martin designed a remedy for such frustrations. His website "Foreign Languages for Travelers" (http://www.travlang.com/languages) provides the on-screen phrasebooks for any pair of 52 languages, including Yiddish. Acknowledgements page suggests that Michael Martin shares the credit for the Yiddish part of the collection with Shlomo Lerman. All 102 phrasebooks containing Yiddish come in both Yiddish letters and reasonably good (although not standard and not completely consistent) transliteration. Renderings of some words and phrases might be questionable, but the traveler using this phrasebook will be understood. There are some other shortcomings in the Yiddish pages. Unlike many other languages in Travlang, Yiddish lacks soundfiles, associated with all the words and phrases. Hopefully, they would be added. The site uses state flag icons as logos for all languages and as the page background for the respective pages. Assignment of the Israeli flag to Yiddish pages provokes certain ambivalence. Even more importantly, all languages on Travlang site are accompanied by a brief geographical description (e.g. "Finnish is spoken in Finland", "Galician [not Galitsianer - i.v.] is spoken in Spain and Portugal", etc.). Yiddish is the only language where this remark uses past tense: "Yiddish originated in Germany, Poland, Lithuania, and Ukraine", and does not mention any current status - effectively classifying Yiddish as a dead language. (Even the Latin page says: "Latin is officially spoken in the Vatican"). The necessary improvements can be made (suggestions from the Mendele subscribers might be very helpful for the site authors) and the Travlang-armed travelers would not have to resort to gesticulation in expressing simple "Ikh farshtey nisht".

Iosif Vaisman

I'm responding to Marvin Engel's query about "strong" language. My contribution to this category is "cholerieh," clearly a reference to cholera, and no doubt the ultimate metaphor of random evil and disgust.

Liebe Denner Santa Rosa, Ca.

I am interested in the dictionary that was edited by Yitskhok Neborski and Shemen Noyberg, Vorterbukh Bibliotheque Medem. It was mentioned in one of the messages on Mendele....I would like to see the book to see if it would help me in my studies. If anyone has the e-mail address of the publisher please e-mail it to me.

Thank you, Nathan Adelman

10)---------------------------------------------------Date: Tue, 16 Sep 1997 20:09:48 -0700 From: Barry Megdal <bmegdal@caltech.edu> Subject: Need Poem for Headstone

I am writing to ask where I might look for a short, appropriate Yiddish poem to be put on my mother's headstone. She passed away in April, and my father, though fluent in Yiddish, is not a poet. My Yiddish skills are nowhere near good enough to even consider writing something myself.

Yet my mother loved poetry, and we both feel that the right Yiddish poem would be an appropriate way to memorialize how we felt about her.

Any suggestions or pointers are much appreciated.

Thanks Barry Megdal Pasadena, CA