Mendele: Yiddish literature and language ______________________________________________________ Contents of Vol. 3.013 May 24, 1993 1) Idioms (Zev Kesselman) 2) Idioms (Martin Davis) 3) Idioms (Eli Katz) 4) Idioms (Jascha Kessler) 5) Idioms (Shleyme Axelrod) 1)---------------------------------------------------- Date: Sun May 23 04:20:29 1993 From: Zev Kesselman Subject: dreyt zikh arum... Excuse my ignorance, but I don't get it. In the phrase, "dreyt zikh arum vi a farts in rosl": vi kimt a farts tzum rosl? Rosl is brine, no? As the gabbai in our shul, I once heard it differently. One of the older congregants complained to me about this child who wandered around the shul aimlessly, disturbing everyone in his path: "Er dreyt zikh arum vi a farts in vaneh". Now that's a moshl! ********************** A programmer colleague of mine from Riga, Mitya Yakirevitch, just taught me how to say the phrase "GIGO" (garbage in, garbage out), in Yiddish: "mishigene gentz, mishigene gribenes". Zev Kesselman 2)---------------------------------------------------- Date: Sun May 23 13:33:59 1993 From: davism@turing.cs.nyu.edu (Martin Davis) Subject: hobn nekome oyf di vantzen My favorite proverb: Er hot nekome oyf di vantzen az dos hoyz brent. (He has his revenge on the bedbugs as his house is on fire.) Martin Davis 3)---------------------------------------------------- Date: Sun May 23 19:00:52 1993 From: katz@Sonoma.EDU Subject: idioms 1. Hershel Bershady notes: I think this is really "rakem" glossed by Weinreich as "supine, face down" and by Harkavy ("rakom") as "crab- like, on all fours". In our house the implication was clearly "with butt in the air". I can remember erev Rosheshone 1938 or 1939. My father was listening to WNYC, the radio station of New York City, which was presenting a musical program in honor of the Jewish "High Holy Days" [irreverently retranslated into Yid- dish by my uncles as "di hoykhe yontoyvim"]. He emerged gleefully to inform us that they had just announced that Cantor So-and-So would now sing rakem. (The announcer had mispronounced "Rakheym".) 2. The suggestion by Bob Hoberman's friend, David Ebin concerning the etiology of "beyze vyetchere" is bril- liant and, I dare say, correct. I'd be interested to know whether the phrase occurs other than in the expression "ikh zol azoy visn fun a ......"? Eli Katz 4)---------------------------------------------------- Date: Sun May 23 21:18:42 1993 From: kessler Subject: to Martin Davis And how do we know he is beating his head against the brick wall? What is the p roverb? I also recalled of course Gey shlug dein kopp in vent. Kessler 5)---------------------------------------------------- Date: Sun May 23 21:22:57 1993 From: Seymour Axelrod Subject: Nokh etlekke idyomen far R'Elyes reshime (A vort frier: I'm glad that Elye remembered "folg mir a gang" as expressing a `disinclination to undertake an effort disproportionate to the result.' Now that I think about it, that's the meaning I recall, rather than "it's a long distance [or time]" [U. Weinreich's and Y. Mark's usage.]) Also, Elye's "a glik *hot* mir getrofn" now sounds as good to my ear as "a glik *iz* mir getrofn". I may well have misremembered.) 1. "oder gor, oder gornisht" = "oder dray, oder draytsn" 2. "glat azoy [in der velt arayn]" = for no apparent reason, at random, irrelevantly 3. "a yid fun a gants yor" = (I think) an ordinary Jew [person]; stam a yid [mentsh] 4. "a terets far di bentshlikht" = a pretext, a phony excuse. I don't recall hearing this in person. In a recording of "Di megile fun itsik manger" (the one with the Bursteins, music by Dov Seltzer)--probably also in Manger's text, which I don't have to hand--Vashti refuses Akhashveyresh's command to come to his party naked, saying that her teeth hurt. Homen-haroshe tells the king (correctly) "s'iz a terets far di bentshlikht, di mayse mit di tseyn." I have no idea how the expression came to mean what it does. --Shleyme Axelrod ______________________________________________________ End of Mendele Vol. 3.013