Hanukkah concert at the Carrboro ArtsCenter, December 13 2015, 4:30 pm

I think this is the fourth year Mappamundi and friends are presenting a Hannukah concert at the Carrboro ArtsCenter. Joining us this year is Roger Lynn Spears on piano. We'll be doing music from our Cabaret Warsaw cd, from Mrs Maccabee's Kitchen (which features new funny lyrics set to folk tunes, ragtime and blues, tangos, swing tunes, even a lonesome cowboy ballad), and some new things altogether. We project all the words as subtitles on the wall so you don't miss any of the jokes.


We're doing the show in the afternoon so you can have time for other Chanukah shows on the same day!

Tickets are $10 at the door or $7 in advance from CabaretWarsaw.com.

For more information contact me at jane@mappamundi.com.


You can also click on picture below to order tickets:

In which I submit "I Can't Keep Up" to Der Yidisher Idol in Mexico City

When I heard there was going to be the second annual "Der Yidisher Idol" this summer I decided I had to enter the competition. I hate competing but I like supporting quixotic causes. I recently held a competition on my telenovela blog and out of the 12,000 visitors we have a day, only TWO people submitted entries. That bummed me out. So if nothing else, I will swell the Mexican contest's applicant pool.

They are calling it the Yiddish version of "American Idol" but it's actually more about songwriting: there's a $750 prize for the best original Yiddish lyrics to an existing tune, and a $1000 prize for the best original Yiddish song, lyrics and tune both. I decided to submit videos in both categories. I've had bronchitis since I came back from snowy Boston a MONTH ago, so I sang these two songs with a lot of coughing in between takes. Lots and lots of coughing. For some reason the second one sounds like I inhaled helium. Oh well.

Here's the first one. A few years ago I fell in love with the 18th century German folksong Stets in trauer and the version I heard was in a Southern dialect that sounded kind of like Yiddish to me. So I decided to write Yiddish lyrics for it. It's a song I really relate to but I wish I didn't. Sadly, I do remember what it's like to be madly in love with a bum and patiently waiting for him to... to what? What do bums ever do? Anyway, here it is, with Roger Lynn Spears on the piano. There are subtitles so you can get the story! Roger did not want to be on camera so I lip-synched this afterwards, a skill I do not have.



So the second one was more of a challenge. I've only written maybe five songs in my whole life and never feel like I have anything to tell the world, so that's a roadblock. I decided to write myself an anthem, why should I not have one? This one, I had to lip-sync and play fake piano because I only have two mics so we couldn't all record it at once.



I used Nahum Stutchkoff's Yiddish Rhyming Dictionary, and his marvellous thesaurus (out of print but you can often find a copy on eBay). And a dictionary. The Yiddish equivalent of "I Can't Keep Up" is Ikh ken nit mithaltn.

I got Sheva Zucker to vet the grammar and help with words - she said some that I'd chosen were "in the dictionary but nobody uses them." Ken Bloom and Jim Baird from our band Mappamundi came for the afternoon to record this as well as priceless songs from the past which will appear here at a later date! (Yaka Hula Hiki Du af yidish and Donkey Monkey Business aka Donki Monki Biznes).

Animated music videos for Yiddish theater songs?

I found these tiny books of cabarat songs from Warsaw: the author, Itzik Zhelonek, said they were famous and popular and the latest thing. I was surprised and then saddened that most of them had disappeared from the world almost entirely and decided to find their melodies and bring them back.

A stupid, time-consuming, expensive project but it's engaged me wholly for more than a year now. After I got my friend Randy to come up from Florida and sing some of the songs with me, I made a digital-only cd called In Odess: Yiddish Songs from Warsaw (see below) with him and with the help of Aviva Enoch and Roger Lynn Spears and Ken Bloom we put out 18 of the songs. I'm also selling sheet music for these songs.

Then I thought I would like to do some animated music videos, but I didn't know how, so I took a couple lessons ... this is the first. (I did some cartoon music videos for the cd Mrs. Maccabee's Kitchen: new Hanukah songs in 2012, but I used the Youtube's GoAnimate rather than starting from scratch.)

There's hardly any point singing in Yiddish if you don't provide captions. The Cabaret Warsaw project proved that if you let people see the translation of your song line by line, they'll laugh at the jokes.

Here's the whole "In Odess" cd. You can buy it for the cost of a taco lunch at the food truck.

Don't count your chickens or...

Fine Yiddish warning:

Don't rub your belly when the little fish is still in the river.

Patsh zikh nisht in baykhele ven fishele iz nokh in taykhele.

Bon mot from Jacob Dineson.

Speaking of the drunken matchmaker (Fishl) and the unhappy lad he has just signed up to marry a wrinkled, yellowed old maid:

Fishl, of course, forgot Alter immediately after the engagement party, just as the gravedigger forgets the corpse immediately after the burial...

"I Can't Complain (But Sometimes I Still Do) got a huge review in the Yiddish Forward!!

My Yiddish teacher, Sheva Zucker, gave me this copy of Itsik Gottesman's review of the cd Aviva Enoch and I just made. He is editor of the Jewish Forverts.

Here's what he wrote:

From the town of Chapel Hill in the state of North Carolina we have received a cd of Yiddish songs with the charming name, "I Can't Complain - but sometimes I still do" (Ikh darf zikh nisht baklogn, ober baklog zikh fundestvegn). Jane Peppler sings and plays fiddle and Aviva Enoch plays piano. Chapel Hill is more known as the home of the University of North Carolina, and the state of North Carolina is a center of traditional American music - but it's no longer a surprise to hear a Yiddish word from there. It's been taught for years at the university, and the annual "Charlotte Yiddish Institute" has become an important undertaking in the Yiddish culture calendar.

Jane Peppler began to sing Yiddish songs in 1979. She directed the Triangle Jewish Chorale for 14 years. Before that, she participated in the Slavic chorus at Yale University and also played violin in the Philharmonia Orchestra at the Yale School of Music. She is interested in folk music from around the world and is now a musician in "Mappamundi," a group which plays international folk music.

Peppler studies Yiddish with Dr. Sheva Zucker and has already translated a number of stories and Jacob Dineson's classic novel "Yosele." She learned some of the songs on the compact disc at KlezKamp, which takes place in the Catskill Mountains every December, in the Vocal Master Classes with the teachers Zalmen Mlotek and Adrienne Cooper.

The recording's greatest virtues are the selection of songs and the well-tailored folkish arrangements. We liked that the duo presented songs from various genres: songs which are rarely sung and even more rarely recorded. But information about the songs, lyricists and composers is lacking in the recording's liner notes, and even on the website.

This is the first time we have heard the songs "Zing, Brider, Zing" (Sing, brothers, sing) and "Birobidzhan." The melody for "Birobidzhan" is utterly beautiful and the piano and fiddle twine in and out, creating a noble spirit. The usual songs about Birobidzhan are faster and more jolly, but this song, full of hope for tomorrow, has a completely different sentiment.

Itsik Fefer's song "Di Elter" (Old Age) was also new to us - we knew it only with the melody Chava Alberstein created and recorded with the Klezmatics on the recording "The Well."

Peppler composed a fine original melody for the folk song "Hob Ikh Mir a Mantl" (I Have a Coat) and added a new verse to the song "Gris, Bagris" (Greet, greet) which Lazar Veyner and Leybush Lerer created for Camp Boyberik in the 1920s. She learned the song from Zalmen Mlotek at KlezKamp. Another original composition is "Hilda's Waltz" by the pianist Aviva Enoch - it's the only instrumental piece on the compact disc.

They learned "Don un Donye" (verses by H. Royzenblat, music by Mikhl Gelbart) from the songbook "Pearls of Yiddish Song" by Hannah and Yosl Mlotek. Jane Peppler clearly loves folksongs or art songs like "Don un Donye" which have a folklike character. The duo doesn't, however, avoid theater songs - like Molly Picon's "A Bisl Libe" (A Little Love) by Josef Rumshinski, which comes from the theater production "Tsipke" of 1924. The Milkin Archive contains the song in its collection, sung by a singer with a strong voice and an orchestral accompaniment. Peppler's simpler version also has charm.

The comic folksong "Fraytig oyf der nakht" (Friday night) was very popular in the "old country" and it's a pleasure to hear it with Enokh's piano accompaniment. Peppler's voice rushes a bit too quickly here; her voice is not strong or trained enough for this tempo. It would be better sung more slowly and sweetly. In "Harbstlid" by Beyle Schaechter-Gottesman, she sings with heart, but also too quickly.

On the other hand, when one hears the prayer "Got fun Avrom", sung without accompaniment, and "Bobenyu," in which she sings more slowly, one feels clearly that the singer doesn't strain and she sings these songs as they should be sung.

The recording concludes with the theater song "Glik" (Luck), Fefer and Yampolski's "Yidishe Khasene" (Jewish wedding), and a Hebrew song, "Ta-am Haman."

Jane Peppler and Aviva Enoch have worked carefully on their arrangements, and the two musicians capably present the songs. One wants to hear them again.

Since the majority of compact discs these days emphasize klezmer music, and not Yiddish songs, it's wonderful to hear a recording like this, which expresses such love of the Yiddish word and song.

Click here to go to the Skylark Productions site and buy the album.

Sholem Aleichem on sensational novelas

I just translated this from "Kasrileke Progress." Reminds me of Univision and the telenovelas...

During the time I was in Khasrilevke, both local newspapers, "The Yarmulke" and "The Cap," published a highly interesting and thrilling novel. One called it "The Forbidden Kiss from the Stolen Bride" and the second called it "The Stolen Kiss from the Forbidden Bride."

As the above-mentioned Kasrilevke highbrow led me to understand - confidentially, as usual - the said novela was taken from an old Russian book through the efforts of two literati, who endeavored to smear its plots out as thinly as possible in all directions to make it longer, and - in order to keep the public in suspense - they were constantly thinking up new sensations, suddenly coming up with a fresh, healthy hero, lively right off the bat, who was not slow to bring a couple of women down from the Other World if it suited them.

And if you like, they'll start right over again from the beginning...

The truth must be told, however: in Kasrilevke the said novela was being read with great eagerness. People lick their fingers over it, looked forward to it. Morning barely passes, they throw themselves at the "Forbidden Bride."

In the normal course of things, there'd have been an end to it long ago. The authors themselves were hard-pressed to continue drawing out the suspense. They'd killed off the novela's protagonists long before: some had been hung, some poisoned, some shot. But in the course of their dismal competition, the editors demanded the story be drawn out still more: neither wanted his story to end before the other's.

During the time I was in Kasrilevke, it happened that some of the story's heroes were being shot for the THIRD time, and the Forbidden Bride had been stolen twice - kidnapped and tortured, thereafter sought and found, then stolen again, and again murderously tortured. There was just no end to these authors' atrocities - I have no idea what they were thinking!

Winnipeg's finest all-Yiddish radio program!

I met Rekhl Zucker at the Medem Bibliotheque at the intensive Yiddish seminars and got on the mailing list for her radio show, which airs most Sundays. She has an amazing record collection, I've heard some gems on her programs.

You can listen live on Sundays, 2:00-2:30 CDT, on CKJS.com.

And here is Rekhl's Yiddish radio archive where her old shows are kept. (You can search by date.)

Here's a singer, Joanne Borts, that I first heard on Rekhl's program. Just a snippet (the actual song starts about 0:49):

Vi azoy lebt der keyser? aka "How does the tsar drink tea?"

I just bought an amazing mp3 of Paul Robeson singing this song in quite good Yiddish. Nu?

Vi azoy lebt der keyser? (How does the tsar live?)
Rabosay, rabosay, khakhomim on a breg,	Gentlemen, gentlemen, endlessly wise,
Kh'vel aykh fregn, kh'vel aykh fregn,	I want to ask you a question.
- Nu, freg zshe, freg zhe, freg,	- Nu, ask, ask, ask:
Entfert ale oyf mayn shayle:	Everybody answer my question:
Vi azoy trinkt der keyser tey?	How does the Csar drink tea?
Me nemt a hitele tsuker,	You take a cylinder of sugar,
Un me makht in dem a lekhele,	And carve a hole on the top,
Un me gist arayn heyse vaser,	And into it you pour hot water
Un me misht, un me misht ...	And then stir and stir.
Oy, ot azoy, oy, ot azoy,	Oy, just like that, oy, just like that,
Ot azoy trinkt der keyser tey!	That's how the Csar drinks tea.
Rabosay, rabosay, khakhomim on a breg	Gentlemen, gentlemen, endlessly wise,
Kh'vel aykh fregn, kh'vel aykh fregn.	I want to ask you a question.
- Nu, freg zhe, freg zhe, freg.	- Nu, ask, ask, ask:
Entfert ale oyf mayn shayle:	Everybody answer my question:
Vi azoy est der keyser bulbes?	How does the Csar eat potatoes?
Me nemt a fesele puter	You take a barrel of butter
Un me shtelt avek dem keyser oyf der anderer zayt,	And you place it opposite the Csar
Un a rote soldatn, mit harmatn,	And a company of soldiers, with cannons,
Shisn di bulbes durkh der puter	Shoot the potatoes through the butter
Dem keyser glaykh in moyl arayn ...	Straight into the Csar's mouth.
Oy, ot azoy, oy, ot azoy,	Oy, just like that, oy, just like that,
Ot azoy est der keyser bulbes!	That's how the Csar eats potatoes.
Rabosay, rabosay, khakhomim on a breg,	Gentlemen, gentlemenn, endlessly wise,
Kh'vel aykh fregn, kh'vel aykh fregn.	I want to ask you a question.
- Nu, freg zhe, freg zhe, freg.	- Nu, ask, ask, ask:
Entfert ale oyf mayn shayle:	Everybody answer my question:
Vi azoy shloft der keyser bay nakht?	How does the Csar sleep at night?
Me shit on a fuln kheyder mit federn,	You fill a room with feathers
Un me khmalet ahin arayn dem keyser,	And you wham the Csar in,
Un dray polk soldatn	And three regiments of soldiers
Shteyen a gantse nakht un shrayen:	Stand all night and shout:
Sha! Sha! Sha!	Shah! Shah! Shah!
Oy, ot azoy, oy, ot azoy,	Oy, just like that, oy, just like that,
Ot azoy shloft der keyser bay nakht!	That's how the Csar sleeps at night.

Intro to "The Old Story" by Mendele Moykher Sforim

I know I said I'd blog every day this month but I've had a huge number of projects on. Here's one of them - I've been translating a short piece by the famous Yiddish author Mendele Moykher Sforim - it's called "the Old Story" and here is the preamble...

And so sayeth Mendele Mokher Sforim, the story I plan to tell you is at first glance an old one, but whatever, gentlemen, it still serves us Jews quite well in these modern times. "What are we? What is our life?" I ask you! What, then, is Jewish life as a whole? In essence a long, old story, repeating itself forever anew, in various forms and appearances according to the fashion of every epoch. Always the same story with different uproars, nuisances, pressuring, rushing about, with botherations and disputations, muddled machinations, squeezing, itching and bedevilment.

Every generation has its sages, good pious folks, as well as the languishing, crestfallen, down-trodden, poor things, and fools, and up and coming newly minted fools, and strivers, aggrandized insolent faces, boors, busybodies stirring the pot something dreadful... that Korukh, the long-ago rich man, leader of a gang, the bully who pushed himself toward the priesthood in order to be the great elder, the uppermost - Korukh is still with us today, too, his name is Yonkl, Berl, Yotsmakh, Shmerl, just with a tiny twist: he also pushes his way to the head of the table (place of honor) and wants to be indispensable.

That long-ago traitor Sonbalat with his gang of backbiters, liars, schemers, skillful at dismissing anyone with tedious monologues, with slander, not slow to whip out a pen and write a "song of praise" to make things worse, to destroy someone with a wall of words -- those fine people, oh well, the devil hasn't taken them away from us in these modern times. They're here, they grow and sprout, thank God! The point is, really, as the saying goes: "That which was, will be," there's nothing new under the bright sun. The thing is, something comes along - colonies, for instance - and people say, "See, this is new!" No, brothers, it's already been with us in the world for a long time, just take a look, if you will, at this story here, you'll see that Jews have had their heads buried in the dirt for a long time already ... you'll also see that just as every town has her village idiot, her ruffians and pranksters all around, so she also has her wise man, her sage advisor, and - set against him - her immensely powerful nabob, a fine skillful fellow, who will, for spite, turn everything upside down and backwards, and beyond that is oy, okh un vey iz mir!

Napoleon and the tailor - a Yiddish folktale

My loose translation from Immanuel Olsvanger

When the emperor Napoleon was fleeing Russia, he found himself running through a Jewish village. He's running, and the Russians are right behind him!

When he saw a passel of soldiers hot on his heels, he ran quickly into the little house of a simple tailor and said to him in a shaky voice: "Hide me quickly or they'll kill me!"

The tailor didn't know who he was, but when someone begs you to save him, you save him. He said to the emperor: "Be so good as to crawl into my bed under the feather comforters, and lie there and don't move!" And the emperor got into the bed, and the tailor covered him with one feather comforter and another, and a third and a fourth as well.

Not a moment had passed when the door flew open and and two soldiers with spears rushed in. "Has anybody come in here to be hidden?"

The Jew said, "No! Who would come here to be hidden?"

The soldiers searched here and there, and finally stabbed through the feather comforters on the bed a couple of times - there was nobody. They went away, back to wherever they came from.

When they were well and truly gone, the emperor crept out from under the comforters, pale as the wall. He says to the Jew: "You should know - I'm the emperor Napoleon. And because you've saved me from certain death, you can ask me for three things. Whatever they may be, I'll give them to you!"

The poor Jew thinks a minute and says: "Look here, emperor my dear, see how my roof leaks? It's been this way for two years already. Maybe you could have somebody fix it?"

The emperor looks at him and says: "You blockhead, of course I'll do it! You're asking such a modest thing from me? Ask for something better! But remember, now you can only ask for two more things."

The little tailor turns it over in his head: what better thing can he ask for? He thinks and thinks, and eventually he says: "Here, on the same street as me, lives another tailor, he's taking some of my customers. If only you could get him to to move someplace else!"

The emperor waves impatiently and says: "There's an idiot for you! Typical! OK, I'll get that other tailor to go to the devil! But can't you think up anything bigger to ask for? You only get one more wish!"

The Jew heard this and thought very hard; finally he smiled and asked: "I'd like to know, please tell me, how did you feel, lying in my bed, when the soldiers stuck their swords through the bedcovers?"

The emperor heard this and was outraged. "How dare you ask? The nerve! For this kind of impudence I'll have you shot, you so-and-so!" He immediately called a couple of his soldiers, and they clapped the tailor in irons and carried him away.

You can just imagine how the Jew's heart trembled in his bosom, especially after they said: "You'll be shot tomorrow morning." He probably didn't sleep all night! He cried and shook, quivered and quaked, and said confession.

Next morning he was tied to a tree, and three soldiers stood facing him with their rifles. And a fourth stood to one side with a watch in his hand, waiting for the moment of execution.

Finally he raised his arm and started counting: "One! Two! Thr..."

He had not quite called out the word "three" - and here comes a General on a horse, shouting "Stop, don't shoot!" He goes to the Jew and says: "The emperor forgives you, and he's sent you this note."

Sighed with relief, the Jew took the note and started reading. And this is what the note said: "I felt then exactly as you were feeling just now."

The tailor has kept the note with him to this very day.

My latest Yiddish translation: A preamble by Mendele the Book Peddler

This is an excerpt from the introduction to Mendel Moykher Sforim's first book; we read it in Paris this summer at the Medem Bibliotheque and it was my favorite piece by far. I finally had the time to translate it for my own pleasure and, I hope, for yours.

A preamble by Mendele the Book Peddler

On the occasion of his coming forward into the world with his very own stories, published for the first time

"What's your name?" That's the first question one Jew asks another, a complete stranger, the minute he meets with him and rattles off a how-do-you-do. When this happens, it wouldn’t occur to anybody to give a response like, "What's it to you, brother, that you should know my name? So we're going to marry our children to each other, then? I have the name I was given, and leave me alone!"

On the contrary, the question "What's your name?" is completely natural, it lies as easily in one's nature as it does to finger someone’s new caftan and ask: "How much did it cost you? How much was this fabric by the yard?" - as it does to take, uninvited, a cigarette from someone else's open pack - as it does to stick a finger into their tobacco pouch and take from it a pinch of snuff - as it does to ask somebody, suddenly, out of the blue, about his business and to outline for him your suggested improvements although he hasn't any urgent need for them at all and can do quite well without them, as indeed he can also do without you.

Such things are natural by us Jews, this is just how the order of things has been since the dawn of time, and to take a stand against it would amount to insanity.

I know quite well that now, at my first, initial arrival, during my first foray into Yiddish literature, or as you might say, with my stories, certainly the public's first question will be: "What do they call you, uncle?"

My name's Mendele! Thus, gentlemen, was I named - after a great-grandfather on my mother's side, Reb Mendele the Muscovite, of blessed memory. Back in the day he was given this name because, as the story goes, he did actually get all the way to Moscow once, in point of fact, trading for Russian goods, and he skittered back here again lickety split, in the blink of an eye, before they had the chance to come around and throw him out of there. Anyhow, that's not what I'm getting at. What foolishness!

Nevertheless, he actually was in Moscow, with Tsar Fonye as they say. This procured for him a good name and reputation in his little corner. Everyone considered him an experienced, sophisticated man, who'd been around the world, and when there was trouble, or when there was need of writing an official letter, they'd ask his advice. But that's not my point either.

With this alone, though, the ritual is not complete. After the aforementioned first question, Jews generally start up gushing all kinds of questions like, for instance: Where's he from? Is he married? Does he have kids? How's he make his living? Where's he traveling to? Ha!, more and more such questions, this is accepted wherever Jews have settled throughout the diaspora, and if you want to have a decent name for yourself among people, to show that you are, praise God, a fine person, someone who’s been around, not just a bookworm benchwarmer, then you're going to have to answer properly, just as a greeting of "Good Sabbos" must be answered with "a Good Year."

I'm not going to pick a quarrel with the world; I'm ready to answer all these questions of yours - quickly and succinctly, if possible.

Myself, I was born and raised in Tsvuetshits (Hypocrite), it's a good-sized town (no Evil Eye), in the Teterivker district, famous for its goodness and piety the way Glupsk (Stupid), for instance, is known for its wisdom, Kaptsansk (Poverty) for its wealth, and Tunyadevke (Do-Nothing) for its factories. Beautiful places, with such merits, praise God, as have prevailed and influenced the Jewish condition in our little corner of the exile... but that isn't my point.

My passport states my age most efficiently, but in truth, how old I am - as is often the case with Jews - isn't easy to say. My parents, rest in peace, strongly disagreed on the reckoning of my years, but they agreed I was born at the lighting of the first Hanukah candle during the terrible fire that burned the stores (let it not happen again)...

It was around the time the red cow calved, and by the last day of Hanukah her milk was so abundant she made milk varenikes for half the village, varenikes that made folks lick their fingers and with a taste that still lies on the tongues of some of our old Jews to this day... but that isn't what I was getting at either...

My features as stated in my passport are as follows: height, middling; hair and brows, grey; eyes, brown; nose and mouth: average; a grey beard, the face unscarred, and as for "distinguishing marks" - none. That is to say, altogether nothing special, a man of the usual kind, like the majority of men, not an animal, God forbid!

So the question is, a simple straightforward passport completely without distinguishing marks simply shows one is human! Because since when do animals have passports? The answer is, however, that there's no point in asking questions. Listen, this description doesn’t properly show what kind of face I have.

And in point of fact, let's not deceive ourselves, what good will it do you to know, for example, that my brow is a high one with a lot of wrinkles; that my nostrils are very big and somewhat strange; that my face at first glance will seem a bit angry; that when I’m rapt in thought I have a near-sighted squint; and that when I purse my lips it seems a mild, wry smile swims on them.

Foolishness, upon my word! Even my wife didn't interest herself in such trivialities before our marriage. She took me sight unseen, not a glimpse of my face beforehand, and - it turned out all right.

Anyway, now you know, gentlemen, that I'm married. And as for children, no need to discuss it. It's understood, naturally, that I have (no evil eye) quite a few of them. What else, then, does a Jew have? But that's not my point.

My business, as you can see by looking at me, is holy books. I've had more than enough different livelihoods in my life, they threw me all over the place, as usual, until at last I waved my hand and said, "Ah, to the Devil with all these rackets!" and I took to the holy book trade, and that's precisely what I've been living by to the present day.

Hearing that, one might believe, on the face of it, that book peddling is the finest profession, and that I'm rich! And on that basis, Jews - yearning after a fine livelihood, poor things - will follow each other, one after another - they’ll throw themselves, like locusts, onto the book business! I swear to you, Jewish children - I'm a pauper!

Well, if that's the case - if my life is a shlepping, wandering, beggarly one - then the question is, how the Devil did I drag myself into the holy book business? And what holds me to my wares to this very day? It's not easy to answer - it's simply that I had no choice ...

Gentlemen, I confess to you! From childhood on I've had a certain weakness (may it not happen any other Jew) which in the language of the goyim is called 'love of nature.' That is to say, a love of everything that grows, that sprouts, that lives, everything that's found in this world. It pulls me - it pulls - I hope it never happens to you. It gets to me from time to time: a trinket, a pretty little face, a picture, an image, a little blade of grass, a little branch, a little rose, a little bird.

How can it be, people will say, why aren't you ashamed, a Jew with a beard, with responsibilities, married, a father of children, who should by all rights be worrying ...

Oy, well I know that such things are not suitable for a Jew, but what can I do, seeing as how this is my born weakness - my Evil Inclination from the very start, may it not happen to you - that draws me to itself like a magnet.

And so the Evil Inclination (may it not happen to you, my children) muttered to me: "Mendl! Book handling is made to measure for you. Pawn, even if only temporarily, your wife's bit of jewelry; buy a horse and wagon, pack it up with books, and let yourself go forth into the world. If you earn, if you don't earn, it's all the same, the point is the journey, the pleasure you'll have from the beautiful things which will reveal themselves and be heard along the way.

"Traveling the road you'll lean back, lounging like a king on your wagon, and you'll look all around you at every tiny piece of God's artfully beautiful handiwork, and his creatures in mountains and valleys, in fields and forests. Your little horse will pull you slowly, slowly, and you'll look all around, you'll look... That's how it is on the road, and then, coming into little villages and towns, you'll see all sorts of Jews: beautiful faces, fine creatures, strange characters, every manner of being, crooked backs, stuck up noses, sticky-fingered long-armed scoundrels, this kind and the other kind, from the old cut and the new - you'll have a lot of stories to tell about them, to sing and narrate."

Now do you understand, children?

And today, after I've spent a goodly time traveling around in the world, the Evil Inclination mutters to me again. "Publish your stories," he mutters, "the stories you have to tell about Jews after all this time you've spent roaming among them."

OK - they can listen, then - it won't hurt them, God forbid! OK, I thought to myself, all right, with pleasure, let it be so! And so it seems I’ve said my piece..

Incidentally, I'm only human. If I've perhaps forgotten something - no promises, but I’ll try my best to put it into one of my later little books. And, furthermore, if someone has no time and wants to know everything quickly, all at once, may he be so kind as to write to me, he'll quickly receive a clear response.

The Putzmeister? Really? Who signed off on that!?

 

Can you believe it?

Sumerkurz 2009 students and teachers near Medem Bibliotheque, "Maison de la culture yiddish."

Click for a larger view. Taken by Derek Miller, thanks Derek!

 

Melinama does Illustration Friday: "Craving."

This week I had a craving for a stress-reduction art project. When I feel jittery, drawing or painting things which go over and under (like, for instance, Celtic (or Bulgarian) knots) is very calming. I guess you could call it self-medication.

I combined that with another of my addictions this week: I adore Jewish proverbs, although I find fully 80% mostly incomprehensible, possibly because I'm a convert. This one appeals to me, as does the similar saying: "Can't go over it. Can't go under it. Can't go around it. Gotta go through it." (That's for after this one, the one I illustrated, fails.)

It's based on a Bukharan ornament in a book I bought at the Strand Bookstore for a buck.



Technorati Tags: Illustration+friday, Bokharan+ornament, yiddish+proverb, travail

I finally manage to get The Incredibly Miserable Boy laid in his coffin...

I've been spending a few hours here and there translating a Yiddish novela for a friend. I finally crawled over the finish line five minutes ago; the Incredibly Miserable Boy is now in heaven with his pious mother.

The enervating effect this story has had on me reminds me of a big bummer of a class I took at Yale: "The Rise and Fall of the Byzantine Empire."

OK, so you know when a class is called Rise and Fall that it's not going to end on a cheery note - and it's history, so everybody already knows the outcome, there's no final surprise twist - yes, on the last day of class the "barbarians" (that would be our ancestors) swarmed over the walls and fin.

Even forewarned, though, I found it surprisingly hard to force myself to go to class -- considering I didn't even like how things were going when they were at their best. I didn't think the Byzantine Empire was my kind of place. So when the steep, decadent decline descended - well, one thought about sleeping late and initiating one's own decline.

Back to this novela - as I've explained to my patron, translating is like building a house: the first 95% of the house takes 5% of the time, and the last 5% of the house takes 95% of the time. I've only been working on Yiddish for a couple years, and there are quite a few words and passages in this story that I got "mostly right," maybe 95% right. To get them utterly 100% right would require a lot of expensive face time with our local Yiddish professor Sheva Zucker.

Also, it has to be decided how much of a rewrite to do. The author was Mr. Purple Prose, and he used a fairly limited vocabulary - perhaps because his intended readership was busy, poorly-educated housewives. How many times per page can a speaker "shriek" - should I wield a thesaurus lavishly or stick with the original? He was also a master of badly constructed run-on sentences. Do I try to imitate his, uh, Byzantine structures or do I insert a sturdy number of periods?

.

Melinama does Illustration Friday: "Memories"

I'm thinking about doing a series of postcards with old themes.

This is a proverb I read in I. B. Singer's Gimpel the Fool, which I'm currently translating for myself. The Yiddish is hard to translate succinctly, it really says something more like: If/since/because God gives shoulders, one must "shlep" (drag, carry) the pack.


Technorati Tags: Illustration+Friday

Yidish-Vokh 2008

I've been at "Yiddish Week." For six days there are various programs and classes you can go to, but the only strict rule is 'me redt nor Yidish' everywhere: at meals, in the swimming pool, on walks, by the campfire, everywhere. Often I thought of the mythical book Michael Chabon cited - "Yiddish for Travelers" - and wished it existed. (Actually, it does, but it's called "Say it in Yiddish" and I just ordered a copy from Barnes & Noble.)

It's held at the Berkshire Hills Emanuel Adult Vacation Center in Copake New York.

I was nervous about going because I'm tongue-tied in foreign languages and I was afraid folks would be snobbish. A few were but most weren't. I figure I was in the bottom 10% of fluency (bottom 15% if you count the babies too) but at least not in the bottom 5%.


It's a big bunch of cabins, some with singles, with a lake house, a theater, a big meeting pavilion, a dining hall, an arts-and-crafts center, a swimming pool, a big lake and boats and lots of grass. In a nearby stream I saw a huge heron fishing one morning and you don't have to go far to see cows. No donkeys, though.


On the left is Yudis, she's 21 years old and ran the camp with grace and friendly efficiency.


There is an entire spectrum of opinions on religion among the campers, from complete atheists and secular folks who like the language and culture to those who are modern or traditional orthodox Jews.

Here you see 2/3 of the string crew; their job was to run a string around the whole camp on Friday (it's called an eruv) so it would constitute, technically, one building. Orthodox folks could carry stuff around without violating Shabbos.


Here's a camper using the arts and crafts room. There was mask-making, paper-cutting, block-printing, water-colors, and costuming going on here all week.


Here is the other camper who was using the arts and crafts room at this particular time. He was making groggers (noisemakers) out of chickpeas and plastic cups for "Purim in August," a skit about Haman's inferiority complex.

My favorite flower (mayn balibte blum)

I took this picture on the way out of camp this morning as we headed for the airport after Yiddish Week. Chicory may be a weed but the blue of it delights me.

Chicory is chikoria (or was it tchikorye?) in Yiddish, I was informed by someone who told me that long after she moved from Poland to America his mother longed for hot brewed chicory - it was used over there instead of coffee because it was cheaper "but a lot of people preferred its flavor."

We got caught in the FAA computer outage today and so I feel lucky to be home, but it's been a long day. Jethro enjoyed the kosher peanut-butter sandwich I brought him. The chickens are all dead - but that's another story.

"The Big Windfall," by Sholom Aleichem, translated by me, part four (end)

I did this translation for Scott Davis, proprietor of JewishStoryTeller.com and author of "Souls are Flying," with the sage counsel of Musia Lakin.

In part one, part two, and part three, Tevye barely supports his wife and daughters by dragging logs to town and selling them. He's making his weary way home one evening when he comes upon two rich ladies lost in the woods. They nag him into turning his wagon back towards Boyberik (it's like a fancy gated community) and taking them to their dacha (fancy country home). When they arrive, the family is delighted to have "auntie" and "mama" home again, and the head of the household asks Tevye how much money he wants for his kind act. Meanwhile, they offer him brandy and food.

---

The Big Windfall, (A Groyse Gevins) part four
Sholom Aleichem

I say thank you. "A little brandy," I say, "for example. Except, I'm sitting here and feasting while there, at home, my wife and children - they should be healthy - if you could see your way clear to..."

Briefly, they were able to decipher what I meant, and packages were put in the wagon, each one separate, bread and fish, roasted meat, quarters of chickens, tea and sugar, a bowl of shmaltz, a jar of preserves. "This," they say, "you can take home as a present for your wife and kids. And now," they say, "how much shall we pay you for your efforts, since you have gone out of your way?"

"It all depends," I say, "what's fitting? As much as your good will deems proper," I say, "that's how much you should pay. We'll come to an understanding, as they say, 'one coin more or less.' A guy who scratches for a living won't be any the worse off for more scratching."

"No," they say, "we'll hear from you yourself, Reb Tevye! Don't be afraid, nobody's going to knock your head off, God forbid."

"What should I do?" I muse to myself. "It's terrible - if I ask one ruble, well maybe I could have gotten two. But if I say two, maybe they'll think I'm a madman, asking 'why so much'?"

"THREE!" came out of my mouth, and the crowd was laughing so hard, I practically buried myself in the ground from embarrassment. "Don't be offended," I say, "maybe I've blundered here. A horse," I say, "stumbles on his four feet, so why not a man with his one tongue?"

There was louder laughter. They were holding their sides laughing. "That's enough laughing, already," calls the rich man, and he takes a big purse from his pocket. "How much do you think is customary? Go on, guess! A tenner, red as fire! Will that please you?" Then he says: "This much, children, he's gotten from me, now you all give from your pockets the amount you think is right."

In short, what do you know? Threes and ones began to fly onto the table - my hands and feet were shaking. I thought I'd fall in a faint.

"Nu, why are you just standing there?" the rich man said to me. "Pick up the coins from the table and take them back safely to your wife and kids."

"God should give you," I say, " 'twice as much' - you should possess ten times, a hundred times as much. May every good come to you, with great enjoyment!" I gathered up the money with both hands. Who counts it? I stuffed it in all my pockets. "Good night," I say, "and be healthy, and you should have," I say, "great joy, you and your children and grandchildren, and your whole family!" And I head for the wagon.

The rich lady, the one with the silk kerchief, calls out to me: "Stay a little longer, Reb Tevye, you're going to get a wonderful present from me if God wills. Come back in the morning - I have," she says, "a brown cow, it was once a wonderful cow, she used to give twenty-four glasses of milk a day. Now she isn't milked, that is to say, you can milk her but you won't get any milk."

"Live long!" I say. "You shouldn't have any misfortunes. Your cow will get milked and give milk at my place, my old lady is (no evil eye) such a housewife as can make noodles from nothing. From a finger she can make grated farfel! With miracles she makes Shabbos! With a game she can put the children to sleep! Don't be offended," I say, "perhaps I've blurted out more than I should ... good night, everything good now and always, and be healthy!" I say, and I get ready to go.

I look around the courtyard for the wagon, I look for the horse - oy vey, a misfortune, an evil blow! I look all around, 'the child is not there' - no horse!

"Nu, Tevye," I think to myself, "now you've got a problem."

A fine story comes to me, one I read once in some little book, how a gang got hold of a certain Jew far from home, a Chasid, lured him to a palace outside of town, gave him food and drink, and then, suddenly, all at once, they disappeared! Leaving him alone with a female, who quickly became a wild beast, the beast turned into a cat, the cat to a dragon... "See now, Tevye," I say to myself, "haven't you gotten yourself into hot water?"

"Why are you scratching about like a beaver, Tevye, why are you grumbling?" they asked me. "Why am I scratching about?" I answer, "Because, oy vey iz mir, why do I live on this earth, I have a disaster, my horse..."

"Your horse," they tell me, "is in the stable, be so kind as to go back there and see him."

I go to the stable and take a look: yes, as I'm a Jew! There's my lad, standing happily among the rich man's horses, thoroughly engrossed in chewing, grating away at those tasty oats, as if they were the whole world.

"Listen, my wise fellow" I tell him, "it's time for home! Pull yourself away right now, 'more is forbidden.' Eating too much, they say, can be harmful."

So, briefly - I just barely managed to pry him away. I hitched him to the wagon and we left for home, happy and lively, singing a hymn, completely intoxicated. Also, my horse was completely different from before - a new hide was growing on him! I didn't need to use the whip, he went like a song.

When we got home, it was already late at night. I woke my wife with elation: "A good holiday greeting!" I say to her, "Congratulations, Goldie!"

"A dark, bleak mazl tov to you," she says, "what's with the holiday cheer, my dear breadwinner? You coming back from a wedding or a bris, my goldspinner?"

"It was a wedding AND a bris!" I say. "Wait, my wife, soon you'll see a treasure! First," I say, "wake up the children - let them, poor things, also take pleasure in the delights from Yehupetz!"

"Are you crazy, have you lost your mind, are you deranged, are you out of your senses? You're talking kind of like a crazy man (it should happen to our enemies)" my wife said to me, and she cursed, in fact she read me the Chapter of Curses, as wives generally do.

"A wife," I say, "is always a wife. Not for nothing did King Soloman say that among his thousand wives he couldn't find one good one. It's lucky, as I live, that it's gone out of fashion these days to have a lot of wives..." I go out to my wagon and drag in all the good things that had been packed for me, and I put everything out on the table.

My bunch saw rolls, smelled meat, they fell on the table like hungry wolves, poor things. There was a grab-fest. Their hands trembled. Their teeth went to work. This happened as in the book: 'and they ate.' As Rashi says, there was a crackling like locusts. I had tears in my eyes...

"Nu, tell already," my missus goes, "who is it that provided such a poor meal, or rather, such a feast? And why are you so proud?"

"I've got time," I say. "Goldie, you'll know everything. Fire up the samovar," I say, "and then we'll all sit around the table, drinking little glasses of tea, as it's customary to do. Such a man," I say, "lives just once in the world, not twice. In particular," I say, "as we're now going to have our own cow that gives twenty-four glasses of milk a day. In the morning, by the grace of God, I'm going to go get it.

"And so, Goldie," I say to her afterwards, whipping out the whole packet of banknotes, "and so, be a clever housewife and guess how much gold we have?"

I sneak a look at my wife. She's beside herself, dead as a wall, she can't speak a word.

"God be with you, Goldie my heart," I say, "what's frightened you so? Maybe you're afraid," I say, "that I've been embezzling, or that I've stolen it? Feh!" I say, "you should be ashamed of yourself! You've been Tevye's wife all this time and you can still suspect me of such a thing? Silly woman," I say, "this gold is kosher, earned by my own cleverness and my slaving away. I have," I say, "rescued two women from great peril. If not for me, God knows what would have happened to them!"

Briefly, I told her the whole story from A to Z. How God had taken me around and around. And we both counted the money again and again. There was exactly twice 36 and one more, 37 karbn! My wife started crying.

"Why are you crying, you silly thing?" I say.

"Why shouldn't I cry," she says, "it just happens, when the heart is full the eyes overflow. God help me," she says, "I swear my heart told me you'd be coming home with exciting news. I can't remember," she says, "the last time Grandma Tsaytl, God rest her soul, came to me in a dream. I'm sleeping, suddenly I dream of a milk pail, full as can be. Granny Tsaytl, rest in peace, carries the milk pail under her apron so nobody will give it the evil eye, and the children cry, "Mommy, mama..."

"Don't eat the noodles before Shabbos, my soul," I say, "Let Granny Tsaytl have a happy time in paradise." I say, "I don't yet know if we'll get any milk from the cow. Except, if God was able to make such a miracle as that we shall now have a cow, probably he'll see to it that the cow gives milk... it would be better if you'd give me advice, Goldie my heart. What shall we do with the gold?"

"I may as well ask you," she says to me, "What do you figure we can do - no evil eye - with such capital?"

And we both thought about this and that, each of us broke our heads. That night we imagined getting into - what you will - we bought a pair of horses, and soon sold them, making a profit. We opened an imported goods shop in Boyberik, sold out the stock, and then immediately opened a dry goods store. We took on a bit of forest land, made a bit on that, and then got out of it - we then tried buying the Anatevka tax office, made a percent on that, God willing, then turned the money over, started lending it out for more profit...

"My crazy enemies!" my wife says to me. "You let loose our few pennies until you're left with only your whip?"

"What then," I say, "get into the grain market and go bankrupt, is that better? The world's tough these days, utterly destitute, because of wheat. Go, just go see what's doing in Odessa!"

"What does Odessa matter to me? My grandfathers didn't go there and my children won't be there as long as I live and my feet carry me."

"What do you want?" I say.

"What do I want?" she says. "I want you not to be a dummy talking all this nonsense."

"Oh, sure," I say, "now you're a wise sage. As people say: aren't you suddenly so smart. It's always this way."

So to make a long story short, we started quarreling a few times and then quickly made up, and this is the plan we came up with: we'd buy another cow, one that actually gives milk, to go with the one we'd been given.

Perhaps you'll ask: "Why a cow? Why not a horse?" I'll answer you: why a horse, why not a cow? Boyberik is quite a place, the genteel wealthy people of Yuhupetz come out there to their dachas, and since the Yehupetzers are such genteel folk, used to the best, one should bring everything to them all prepared, right into their mouths: meat and eggs and chickens, onions, peppers, parsley - so why shouldn't there be someone similar who undertakes to bring cheese and butter and sour cream, etc. straight to their houses?

Especially seeing as how the Yehupetzers take their eating seriously, and they've got money, as it's said: a sharp guy can really make some pretty money there, he can earn really fat. Especially, above all, as long as the goods are the real thing. And stuff like I have, you can't find even in Yehupetz (I should share these blessings with you).

How many times have even the big shots begged me, I should bring fresh goods. "We've heard, dear Tevye," say the gentiles, "that you're an honest man, even though you're a Jew, a rat, a canker..." Do you think I'll ever hear such a compliment from a Jew? May my enemies live so long! One doesn't hear a single good word from our little Jews. They only know to come poking around, looking in every bowl. They see Tevye has his own cow, a new wagon, they begin to break their heads wondering: How'd he get this stuff? Is this said Tevye counterfeiting? Is he distilling moonshine on the sly?

Ha ha ha! Let them torment themselves, brothers! Good luck to them, they should break their heads in good health!

I don't know if you'll believe me - you're just about the first to hear the whole story, the how and what and when... only it seems to me, maybe I've spoken too long. Don't take offense. One should keep in mind, as the good book says, 'each to his own,' you to your little books, I to my pails and jugs.

I'll just ask you one thing, sir: that you don't write me into a book, and if you do, at least don't use my real name. Be healthy and may things always go well for you!

THE END.

Technorati Tags: yiddish, tevye, tevyeh, sholem+aleichem