Yiddish lit in translation discussion

I am obsessed with Yiddish writers. I've been reading Yiddish in translation almost exclusively lately. I love Mendele Mocher Seforim, Sholem Aleichem, Jacob Dineson and I.L. Peretz. I am constantly searching for new books to read. Tell me your favourites so I can read them in the new year!
Thanks,
M

Ones I've enjoyed recently include "Pioneers" by Sh. An-ski and "On the Landing" by Yenta Mash. . .

Thanks Daniel! I will look into reading those books in the coming year.
Madeleine :)

David Bergelson-Soviet Jewish writer-many translations, eventually murdered by Stalin. Wonderful modern writer-reminds me of Chekhov.
I've taken two courses on Yiddish literature in translation, one just last year. Last year we focused mostly on women's writing which for a lot of reasons is almost entirely poetry.
Would love to do a group read. Any takers? Sholom Asch's book
East River is something I've wanted to read for years.

Alan,
I read one of David Bergelson's books. I loved it and plan to read more of his books. I have been interested in reading all of the books of the writers that died at the hands of Stalin in 1952. I have accumulated several of them to read.
I am interested in reading the book. I just ordered it from EBAY. I'll let you know when it arrives.
Just out of curiosity, where did you take the classes? Online?
I see that there is a bookshelf associated with this group. Can we add books of interest to it or give you suggestions for it?
I'm excited to chat with you and Daniel about my passion for these wonderful Yiddish masters. It is nice to know I am not an anomaly! LOL!
Madeleine

Oh yeah, cool. I just added a book to see how it works.
I'll try to resist the urge for self-promotion (because I've translated two books from Yiddish myself)

Daniel,
I just ordered that book you placed on the bookshelf also. I have no problem with self-promotion. Have at it, as far as I'm concerned. I am highly impressed. I hope to learn Yiddish one day myself. Reading books in the original Yiddish would be marvelous. My understanding is that some Yiddish words or expressions are difficult to translate into English. I know a little bit of several languages but nothing fluently except my birth language which is English, English. I am adept in Braille and I am rather good at American, English. Maybe I could translate an American, English book into English, English? No, disrespect intended. I am seriously impressed Daniel! I will add books to the bookshelf also if that is okay. Sharing is caring so I have heard. Happy reading, until next time,
Madeleine

Daniel-we were both in Vilnius studying ten years ago. You are
from Ireland correct? You had a girlfriend from somewhere back then. you were in the beginner's class and I was in level two.
And you have become such a big machar. My Yiddish is still
not very good-I was in Tel Aviv last summer studying-a horrible
program and I'm thinking of going to Yivo next summer.
I hope you are well. Do you remember the guy from Seattle?
I lost touch with him and would love to find him.

Alan and Daniel,
I just got the book, The East River, in the mail. I'll start reading and keeping notes. I love reading but I'm not the fastest reader.
M

Hi Alan, that was in 2007 right? Such good times. Did you hear the Vilna program is gone now? Tragic!
Do you remember the name of the guy in Seattle?

HiDaniel,yes I had heard the program folded. I think I read you now work at the medem in Paris.

that info's a couple years out of date :)
I'm now living in a smaller city and doing mostly translation work (you might know the online journal I'm involved with: In geveb?)

Of course I know and love In Geveb. Where did you do most
of your studying? I just did the Tel Aviv program and hated it.
I'm applying for YIVO next summer. I probably saw your name in
In Geveb but without the picture I couldn't identify you.

Hi Madeleine,sorry for excluding you from the conversation lately. I’m just so astonished and impressed byDaniel’s incredible work. And to think I knew him when he was but a lad!

Madeleine have you studied any Yiddish before? If you are interested there is an excellent online -classroom program starting again at the beginning of March. Just look under workmen’s circle online Yiddish classes. They have numerous classes at all levels,the instructors are some of the top in the world,and because they have students literally from everywhere around the world-I heard a year ago they already had 100 participants-which is incredible for a program that started no more than three years ago. It’s an online classroom setting-they use their own program which is a type of Skype so please check it out.
I’m sorry we never got around to the Sholom Asch because it is a novel I’ve very badly wanted to read. I’m wondering if you Madeleine and Daniel have time we can try for another group read. Maybe you and I Madeleine can read it in English and Daniel can read it in mamaloshen. I’m wondering if you’d like to try and start with a book of stories. I’ve been meaning to read Gimpel the Fool for years. What do you think?

Daniel-total fluke,I turned to my Shmooze podcast and there was an interview with you about your last book! Now I really want to read the Warsaw stories but the only place I can find it is the Yiddish book center and with the exchange(I live in Canada) and the shipping it comes close to fifty dollars. I totally believe in supporting you Daniel and your work, but I’ve had to stop buying books because it got out of control. I’m sorry about this.
So Madeleine if you’re up to it please let me know if/when you want to start Gimpel if that appeals to you. I think starting with a collection of short fiction is more manageable because I’m due to read so many other novels for other groups.

Hoping to eventually hear from y’all,

Alan

Hello everyone! What a lovely conversation. I purchased East River recently and intend to read it in the near future. Would love to participate in a group read if there will be one.

Hi Anna,are you interested in reading Gimpel the Fool right now?

Alan wrote: "Hi Anna,are you interested in reading Gimpel the Fool right now?"

Is it a short story by Isaac B. Singer? If it is - I'm up for it.

It is his first Short story collection. One of the titles in the book is called The Wife Murderer and it has to be among his best.

Alan wrote: "It is his first Short story collection. One of the titles in the book is called The Wife Murderer and it has to be among his best."
I checked on Amazon and it turns out there are multiple editions of the book with the same title and by the looks of it they don't have the same stories. What edition are you referring to? I read some of the Isaac B. Singer works 20+ years ago and enjoyed them a lot. Would like to participate in the group read.

Anna,I’m surprised the contents are not consistent as that was a complete published book that Singer produced. I have the first and I guess original edit upon. I will check.

Ok,I am looking at the fourth on the list-the mass paper pack which is as low as .55 cents. That publisher published most of his work back in the day with very nice dignified covers.

Madeleine if you are still out there would you like to join us?

I have a library copy but I just ordered the edition with the Allegra Goodman introduction because I think that will be helpful.
Singer is a bit of a moving target as it is very difficult to know when he published what when,particularly with his later work. Gimpel was his first translated story done by Saul Bellow and shortly afterwards he included this in his first collection of stories. From here on it’s anyone’s guess because his versions in Yiddish do not coincide with his English translations nor are the English translations direct translations of his original work. A complicated figure who really learned how to work with a commercial reading market. Yet I still think he was a brilliant writer.

Hi Alan. I think Gimpel the Fool is a complete short story in his book of short stories. I have the book in Yiddish. Will need to find it in English translation.

Any public library will have a copy-either the complete works of Singer
or the short story collection called Gimpel the Fool and other
stories.
Welcome Vera!

I'm not obsessed with Yiddish writers--yet--but I am obsessed--a little bit--(although that's a contradiction in terms) with Yiddish. I expect it's because I had no contact with Yiddish growing up or for most of my life. So except for words that have entered the vernacular, I was deprived. So I pay attention to the words in books that contain Yiddish expressions, although if they aren't used, I may not remember them. Most recently I bought a parody of Goodnight Moon with Yiddish words for my grandchildren. Goodnight Bubbala 😍
I'm also interested in the historical treatment of or attitude to Yiddish since the founding of Israel. I read an essay about the Yiddish poet Avraham Sutzkever and about an Israeli movie about him, but don't think the movie's available except at certain film festivals. https://jewishreviewofbooks.com/artic...
I joined to follow along.

Great Jan, there have been several translations of children's
and non-children's books into Yiddish over the years. I think the
first and most famous is Winnie the Pooh. Just last week a
translation of Harry Potter appeared and it sold out in three days!
That's incredible.
Most of us , unless we come from ultra-orthodox backgrounds, come to Yiddish from a distance, at least culturally which is fine.
there is so much to learn and you don't have to be obsessed with it to want to understand where it's been and where it is today.
There are many exceptional books about the history of Yiddish-
I can't remember the name of the best one right now-her first
name was Miriam. Also Aaron Lansky who is a superhero in the
world of Yiddish publishing and preservation has written a wonderful book which again I can't remember the title. It's fun to read and for a book lover of any sort it's a fantastic and very inspiring read. lansky is truly a super hero for the work he has
done over the years and the way his work began is unbelievable-he literally recovered books from dumpsters because people were throwing them away.
The relationship between Yiddish and Hebrew is very complicated and there have been several books on the topic
also written. Jews seem to like writing books! The saying goes
that first Hitler killed Yiddish,then Stalin and then Israel. But
there are reasons why Israel suppressed Yiddish for most of it's
life and now there is a huge revival there going on as there is
in Eastern Europe which I have mixed feelings about.

Sit back, enjoy the ride and maybe you'll feel interested in
even taking a course one day. The literature and the history
of the language/history is fascinating. The Yiddish "renaissance"
lasted for sixty years, then it was almost completely obliterated.
But what was accomplished in those sixty years was extraordinary and thanks to translators like Daniel who is a member of this group-forgotten writers are being beautifully
introduced into English. I'm in the middle of one of his translations and it's just sensational-and even though I've read a lot about the history of Yiddish writing-I've never heard about
the writer he has translated and his introduction beautifully outlines the writer's career. Just a massive new contribution to Yiddish literary studies.

I would like to list the titles I've mentioned above-all great books.
The first is Yiddish-a Nation of Words by Miriam Weinstein.
A wonderful history of Yiddish culture written about 19 years ago. She covers everything but the book is almost twenty years old and a lot continues to happen-believe it or not-so it's great for a general survey but not very current. A very quick, very fun read.

Then there is Aaron Lansky's Outwitting History-also a quick
read but a remarkable story, well-told. Really an unbelievable
history of his life and what he has accomplished-really mind-boggling.

Finally I'd like to put in a plug for the current Yiddish book
I've been reading which is translated by our own Daniel Kennedy-A Death:Notes of a Suicide by Zalman Shneour. Daniel's book seems to be available only through the Yiddish
book center-I imagine he received a translation grant from them which is good for those of us who hang out on that site, but
it's such a great work and beautiful translation that the book should be sold in regular bookstores as I'm sure it will be well-beloved. When I first read what the book was about I thought-been there-I've read a lot of 19'th Century lit-particularly the
Russians and as Daniel explains in this excellent introduction,the book is very modeled on Doestoevsky's classic Notes from the
underground. I really didn't feel like walking that path again.
But I started reading it on a bench-in the middle of a very cold
Canadian winter-and I just couldn't stop. Daniel's prose is so
beautiful and so vivid-there is no way I can read this book at this point in time in the original-but it just doesn't read like a
translation because it's a beautiful book in it's own right. It's
not the type of plot everyone would enjoy as it's the story of
a young man who spends all of his time contemplating killing himself with a gun,but the writing is just sensational. Daniel
also has another translation that came out last year-Warsaw Stories by Hersh David Nomberg. This collection seems like it might be more light-hearted but I haven't picked up a copy of
it yet. Anyways Daniel can speak for himself and his work.

What a wonderful list of books Alan! I read Outwitting history and found it to be an excellent book with a very good story, I want to recommend Stolen Words: The Nazi Plunder of Jewish Books
by Rabbi Mark Glickman. Very good book which covers books in Yiddish as well as books in Hebrew.

I'm adding Daniel's translations from Yiddish to my TBR list and will recommend them to my local book club.

I've heard wonderful things about Stolen Words-have to add it to
my pile, thanks.

Thank you, Alan. I think I've heard of the Lansky, and at some point hope to read that. I did hear about Harry Potter!

I was supposed to go next week to Emory (nearby) for a presentation by David E. Fishman on his book The Book Smugglers: Partisans, Poets, and the Race to Save Jewish Treasures from the Nazis. Just heard it's been cancelled due to the coronavirus. When I looked further at the book, I saw that one of those book rescuers was Abraham Sutzkever, and when I looked at the bookshelf here, he's on it. There is a movie that has been made about his life called Black Honey that I've read about but it's not available so far, or wasn't; I don't think it is. I understand he was a champion of Yiddish and an all-round hero.

Yes he was,he eventually moved to Israel and started a very important Yiddish journal which lasted a long time,something unusual for Israel and Yiddish. Ruth Wisse gives an interesting talk about him on you tube. Many thought he was more deserving of the nobel rather than Singer and was considered the greatest Yiddish poet of the past century. Yiddish writers wrote far more poetry than to my liking especially women as men controlled the publishing business and they weren’t interested in fiction written by women. I’m really not a poetry person,never learned to appreciate it,but when you study yid lit there is a tremendous amount of poetry discussed. Jan if Yiddish poetry in translation interests you penguin I believe put out a book of Yiddish poetry many decades ago.

The Sutskever doc. Did the rounds of Jewish film festivals last year. Apparently an excellent film.

Emory-is that Atlanta? Is there a jewish film festival there?

Alan wrote: "The Sutskever doc. Did the rounds of Jewish film festivals last year. Apparently an excellent film.

Emory-is that Atlanta? Is there a jewish film festival there?"

I might check out the poetry!
Yes, Emory is in (metro) Atlanta. Right around the corner from me, actually. The Jewish film festival just ended but I checked and no Black Honey. Hope I didn't miss it under some other name! Hoping eventually it will be released for purchase or streaming.

Yiddish word-of-the-day video series: https://forward.com/yiddish/444999/fo...

Saw this today -- winners of Israel's national Yiddish story contest: https://forward.com/culture/432884/yi...