Mendele: Yiddish literature and language ______________________________________________________ Contents of Vol. 4.417 May 10, 1995 1) Romanian Jewry (Rick Gildemeister) 2) Nokh a bisl (Leybl Botvinik) 3) The Forward needs help with Yiddish (Zellig Bach) 1)---------------------------------------------------- Date: Wed, 10 May 95 09:13:46 EDT From: eeglc%cunyvm.bitnet@yalevm.cis.yale.edu Subject: Romanian Jewry - more I received a request for the citation of the book on Romanian Jewry I had mentioned in connection with my admiration of YIVO and the klal-shprakh. The book is very valuable, since we think of the shtetl as more of an east-central phenomenon, and shtetlekh in Romania really were different from the mold. This book dovetails beautifully with Ghitta Sternberg's book _Stefanesti: portrait of a Romanian shtetl_ (Rick mentioning that book *again*?) Sternberg explains the relations of Jews with the peasantry, and says that they were better than in Slavic Eastern Europe because of the "easygoing Latin temperament" of the peasants. The book I'm about to cite confirms that it was the boyars (groyse pritsim) that were down on the Jews, would not allow them to become citizens and generally wanted to make life unbearable. The upshot was that all of rural Jewry in Romania decided literally to walk out of Romania, and took to the roads. The peasants greeted them along the way, begging them to stay, providing them with food for their journey, and literally crying heyse trern. The reason that this is of general interest was that the western powers, including the U.S. were suddenly flooded with refugees, and it was a good opportunity to get the world community to do something about the pogroms, lack of access to citizenship and generally the autocratic system of government, which was perpetuating what seemed to be an antiquated problem, defined as the "Jewish Question". Fascinating reading (and again, I'll plug Sternberg's book about the "douceur de vie" among the Romanian shtetl-dwellers). If one considers also Bessarabia, a Moldavian/Romanian speech-area, do we maybe have a clue to the plethora of "Romanian" songs that Ellen Prince mentioned on a program she sponsored on WEVD? There seemed to be a lot of songs with Bessarabia and Kesheniver in the title (with lots of freyd "In Romenie iz dokh gut" "Mayn Shtetl Yas" "Ikh benk nokh Besarabie"). Sternberg leads us to believe that life indeed was better than in Poland, since the Jews lived a middle-class life. Ah yes, in Romenye iz geven take zis dos lebn. One caveat to what I am sure is an oversimplification: Bessarabia was the part of Moldavia under czarist Russian control, and Kishinev was the site of a notorious pogrom. And now the citation: Kissman, Joseph. Shtudyes tsu der geshikhte fun romenishe Yidn in 19tn un onheyb 20stn yorhundert. Nyu-york: Yidisher visnshaftlekher Institut, Historishe sektsye, 1944. 118 p. Rick Gildemeister 2)---------------------------------------------------- Date: Wed, 10 May 95 15:20:46 IDT From: leybl@telecomm.tadiran.co.il Subject: nokh a bisl (oder: 'a rendl a vort') in di letste numern mendele (V4.405 un 4.412) iz geven farefntlekht dos vort 'bis' oyf yidish, vi an iberzetsung fun 'byte', oyf english. azoy vayt vi ikh veys, iz dos mayn 'derfindung' (tomer vil an ander dos far zikh, --- iz est gezunterheyt). lomir deriber derklern vi kum ikh tsu dem, un bekhlal vegn andere verter vi dos. mit yorn tsurik (1978-1982), ven ikh hob aroysgegebn dem zhurnal 'Der Nayer Dor' un khob gedarft shraybn vegn kompyuters, hob ikh nokh demolt ongehoybn shafn a reshime iberzetsungen. lemoshl (fun english oyf yidish): Byte=bis; Bit=bisl, Chip=brekl, un andere zise zakhn... di merste fun mayne oysgetrakhte verter hob ikh afile biz haynt nit genutst. zint demolt, iz geven farefntlekht a reshime in Yugntruf, vos dos iz tsuzamengeshtelt gevorn fun odem vitman (oyb ikh makh keyn toes nit), un initsirt durkh dr. mordkhe shekhter. Agev, men darf di reshime banayen, un oysbreytern. oykh farefntlekhn do oyf mendele far di leyners (odem, du herst mir?). Hakitser: Byte tsu bis, iz mayn shtikl humor; un Bit tsu bisl. Derfar ober iz do nokh a termin vos heyst Nibble vos dos iz a halber Byte, oder 4 Bitn. Leybl Fridhandler vet zayn tsufridn tsu hern, az andere hobn oykh a shtikl humor. Oyb Nibble iz a halber Byte, to 'shos' darf zayn oyf yidish Nibble. (ober dos iz vider mayn krumer humor). vi kumt es? far dem darf men borgn fun shimen dzhigan: 'a rendl a vort'. Lomir dos alts vider batrakhtn: 1. ikh veys az Bit kumt funem tzunoyfgus fun 'Binary Digit'; un Bit iz a kleyne zakh, deriber oyf yidish bisl; [farnotirt aykh, az oyf hebreyish ruft men dos 'bit' beys-yud-tes; oyf rusish oykh 'bit']; 2. 8 Bitn (bislekh) iz 1 Byte. der opshtam fun Byte veys ikh nit. Byte vert oykh ongerufn 'oktet'. oyf yidish, leyg ikh for 'bis' (un nit 'bays'); [farnotirt aykh, az oyf hebreyish ruft men dos 'bayit' {=shtub} beys-yud-sof, vos oyf ashkenazish darf men dos aroysreydn 'bayis'; di yisroeyler hobn ye bashlosn tsu farbindn dem klang fun 'bayit' tsu Byte; oyf rusish oykh 'byt']; 3. 4 Bitn (bislekh) iz a Nibble (a halber Byte=bis); vi azoy vert dos 'shos'? azoy: 'a bisl mit a bisl iz a fuler shisl' -- iz dos nor 2, un mir darfn 4. darfn mir deriber tzvey shislekh; iz ober 'shisl' nit keyn kleyn-mos (vi dos iz 'tishl' tsu 'tish'); hob ikh aleyn ekstrapolirt fun dem vort shisl->shis->shos; oyf hebreyish 'nibl'; oyf rusish 'nibl' oyfn PC, un oyf groysram kompyuters (=Mainframe computers) 'tetrad'. 4. Men ken shpiln mit dos oybndermonte, un onshtot 'shos' zogn 'moltsayt' (a shisl mit nokh a shisl makht a moltsayt, neyn?), un makhn fun a Nibble (a halber bis), a gantse 'moltsayt'... 5. Men ken nemen fun di yisroeler dem 'bayit/bayis' un rufn undzer heymisher Byte 'gebayde'[=building], oder farkirtsn dos oyf 'bayde', un dan zogn: Megabayde(s), kilobayde(s),... 6. Un efsher 'rendl' oyf Word? [- an 8-bis-rendl, a 16-bis-rendl,... Shimen Dzhigan z"l volt fun dem gemakht epes, az mir voltn ale geplatst fun gelekhter]. 7. Efsher hobn andere vos tsu zogn??? vos kenen mir lernen fun vi men zogt dos oyf frantseyzish, daytsh, shpanish? leybl botvinik netanya 3)---------------------------------------------------- Date: Wed, 10 May 1995 15:31:31 -0400 From: zellig@aol.com Subject: The Forward needs an in-house Yiddish consultant For purposes of ready identification, I suggest to hold to the folllowing distinction: _Forverts_ for the Yiddish-language paper; _Forward_ for the English-language one. 1. "Meydl" un "Mentsh:" The _Forward_ carries an advertisement section where people looking for mates advertise their "personals." This section is headed by a small banner "Matchmaker, Matchmaker" (very likely from the popular song in "Fiddler on the Roof") and underneath it the phrase, all in capital letters, "Meet a Meydl, Meet a Mensch." I doubt very much if a woman reader of the _Forward_ would look for a "bashertn" in a German "Mensch," but would rather opt gleefully for a Yiddish "Mentsh." 2. Questioning the Forward's Yiddish: In a Letter to the Editor, Susan Saender Rogol, from New Haven, Conn., wrote: "My husband says, since the Yiddish-language mistake was not in Philologos, it does not matter. I say, if you cannot count on the Forward for the most correct use of Yiddish, well, where are we to look? So I want to note that in the Feb. 24 " 'Coffee Talk' Leaves Fans Farklempt" the writer speaks of "shikses and sheygetzes." I know of no "shegetzes," only "shkotzim." Well said, but with a big _however_ in capital letters: To "count on the Forward for the most correct use of Yiddish," is highly questionable. Philologos notwithstanding, he is not an in-house staff member, so he is not around to settle problems of Yiddish usage or spelling in the last hours before the paper goes to press. At times, the romanized spelling of Yiddish words in the Forward is simply outrageously _ameratsish_ (ignorant), and leaves the reader who knows Yiddish "farklemt" (sad, depressed), not "farklempt" [_sic_]. Zellig Bach ______________________________________________________ End of Mendele Vol. 4.417 Mendele has 2 rules: 1. Provide a meaningful Subject: line 2. Sign your article (full name please) A Table of Contents is now available via anonymous ftp, along with weekly updates. Anonymous ftp archives available on: ftp.mendele.trincoll.edu in the directory pub/mendele/files Archives available via gopher on: gopher.cic.net Send articles to: mendele@yalevm.ycc.yale.edu Send change-of-status messages to: listserv@yalevm.ycc.yale.edu a. For a temporary stop: set mendele nomail b. 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