______________________________________________________ Contents of Vol. 3.263 March 6, 1994 1) Various (Mikhl Herzog) 2) Yiddish opera in Vienna (Varda Ullman Novick) 1)---------------------------------------------------- Date: Wed Mar 2 02:29:19 1994 From: ZOGUR@CUVMB.CC.COLUMBIA.EDU Subjects: 1. 'gay' in Yiddish 2. "ganovim-loshn" 3. "tAke gezogt tAkn" 4. Nasalization 5. the name "Feygl" 6. a new book of Yiddish poems 1. Jascha Kessler: Your biases are showing. None of my informants were Zionist Labor. By the way, was my writing so opaque that you couldn't detect the skepticism with which I greeted the responses "az bay undz iz dos nit geven"? Sorry about that. 2. Michael Sweet: I have the same doubts as you about my suggestion, although I'm pleased that you find it seductive. It's advanced in the absence of any evidence that the word "feygele" meaning "a gay" was used in European Yiddish. If your DARE editor partner did, indeed, learn from Yosl (!) Mlotek that the term was used in Poland, I'm content to accept his judgment. I'll even call Mlotek tomorrow to confirm it. My Warsaw informant said "no", though he, too, knew much about the Warsaw Jewish "ganovim", etc. There is a good deal of material on "ganovim-loshn" but it's more than I can do now to provide you with a bibliography. I'd look through the volumes of YIVO's "Filologishe shriftn", "Yidishe filologye" and "Bay undz yidn". 3. Zachary Baker: Concerning the phenomenon which yields forms like "tAkn" 'really' for "tAke", see the Language and Culture Atlas of Ashkenazic Jewry, Volume I, Map 72 (which cites that actual form) along with relevant discussion in the text on p.41, col. 3, # 1.81, and p.42, col. 3f #1.9322. For Zachary Baker: Zach, a propos of Roth's "khom" for "ikh hob", if you listen carefully to any native Yiddish speakers you're sure to pick it up. How about "khomikh bald genumen tsu der arbet"? It's actually the rule wherever the reflexive pronoun varies (as distinct from the universal "zikh". In other words: khOmix, (h)Ost(d)ekh, rOtsikh, (i)ntsOme(rints), (e)tsOtsakh, zO(b)mzekh. When Roth writes "khom" (?) he's just doing the same thing that may Yiddish writers did when they wrote "lom mir". 4. Zachary Baker and Arn Abramson: Concerning nasalization in "mayse", etc. Individual words have their own history (to coin a phrase) but, if a number of words of Hebrew origin are taken into account (mayse, dayges, the feminine form of "roshe" are taken into account), the rule is nasalization everywhere except in Northeastern Yiddish (See LCAAJ I, Map 7). As a rule, we hear "mA:~se" in Poland with a nasalised long vowel. In the Ukraine, an actual "n" is frequent. Tests for the phrase "gantse mayses" yield frequent "gantse manses" and, because of the affrication that gives us Yiddish "undz, gandz, haldz, fintster, fentster (as against German cognates with -ns- or -ls-), we also find "gantse mantses", most recently reported here by Laurie Hollander. There is also a decidedly fully articulated dental or alveolar n-consonant in "reshAnte". As in the name "Yayngkl" (also Litvish!!), the word "dayge(s)" has, as Arn puts it, in Poland "undergone assimilation to the consonant [g] yielding a dorso-velar consonantal articulation that we render in roman script as -ng." However, in Western Yiddish, where the "g" in this word generally yields to "j", the result is "dA:~jes". 5. All and sundry: The Yiddish given name "Feygl/Faygl", (back formation "Feyge/Fayge", diminutive "Feygele/Faygele") has always puzzled me. Since it was my mother's name, "always" is now getting to be a pretty long time. I could never understand how you could name a little girl "birdS". The plural was an anomaly. It's only in Litvish Yiddish that "feygl" is also the singular (which elsewhere is "foygl". I know of no child named "foygl". Actually, "foygl" can be quite a pejorative appelation (without reference to gays). I think I may have discovered the solution to the puzzle in a German dictionary which lists the dialectal variant "veigelein" under the entry "Veilchen" meaning 'a violet', a reasonable feminine name, no? It has precisely the vowel that corresponds to Yiddish ey/ay. 6. Finally: Can I draw your attention to an excellent collection of Yiddish poems by H. Benyomin, just published by Three Sisters Press, in Rowen, County Gwynedd, Wales (sic!). The Yiddish title is "tAke af tshikAves--geklibene lider" (Welsh: "Er Mwyn Cywreinrwydd--Cerddi Detholedig"). The author, better known for his critical writings as Benjamin Harshav (Hrushowski), is an unusually fine Hebrew-Yiddish poet as well. Mikhl Herzog 2)---------------------------------------------------- Date: Wed Mar 2 11:57:26 1994 From: Subject: Yiddish opera in Vienna (Allan Kozinn, in the March 2, 1994, New York Times) "Another unusual new project is 'Fools Paradise,' by Ofer Ben-Amots, a 38-year-old Israeli composer. Based on a story by Isaac Bashevis Singer, the work has a libretto in Yiddish by William Attias and the composer. As the winner of the 1994 Vienna International Competition for Composers, it is to have its premiere at the Vienna Staatsoper, conducted by Claudio Abbado, during the Vienna Festival in November. "Operas in Yiddish are comparatively rare; another recent example, 'Gimpel the Fool,' was also based on a Singer story. (Mozart's 'Zaide' doesn't count.)" Varda Ullman Novick ______________________________________________________ End of Mendele Vol. 3.263 To subscribe, send SUB MENDELE FIRSTNAME LASTNAME to: LISTSERV@YALEVM.YCC.YALE.EDU Mendele has 2 rules: 1. Provide a Subject: line. 2. 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