Author: Gershon WeltmanPublisher:
ISBN:
Category : Humor
Languages : en
Pages : 132
Book Description
Author: A Question of Tradition
Author: Kathryn HellersteinPublisher: Stanford University Press
ISBN: 0804793972
Category : Literary Criticism
Languages : en
Pages : 511
Book Description
In A Question of Tradition, Kathryn Hellerstein explores the roles that women poets played in forming a modern Yiddish literary tradition. Women who wrote in Yiddish go largely unrecognized outside a rapidly diminishing Yiddish readership. Even in the heyday of Yiddish literature, they were regarded as marginal. But for over four centuries, women wrote and published Yiddish poems that addressed the crises of Jewish history—from the plague to the Holocaust—as well as the challenges and pleasures of daily life: prayer, art, friendship, nature, family, and love. Through close readings and translations of poems of eighteen writers, Hellerstein argues for a new perspective on a tradition of women Yiddish poets. Framed by a consideration of Ezra Korman's 1928 anthology of women poets, Hellerstein develops a discussion of poetry that extends from the sixteenth century through the twentieth, from early modern Prague and Krakow to high modernist Warsaw, New York, and California. The poems range from early conventional devotions, such as a printer's preface and verse prayers, to experimental, transgressive lyrics that confront a modern ambivalence toward Judaism. In an integrated study of literary and cultural history, Hellerstein shows the immensely important contribution made by women poets to Jewish literary tradition.
No Joke
Author: Ruth R. WissePublisher: Princeton University Press
ISBN: 140084634X
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 297
Book Description
Why the genius of Jewish humor runs risks as well as rewards Humor is the most celebrated of all Jewish responses to modernity. In this book, Ruth Wisse evokes and applauds the genius of spontaneous Jewish joking—as well as the brilliance of comic masterworks by writers like Heinrich Heine, Sholem Aleichem, Isaac Babel, S. Y. Agnon, Isaac Bashevis Singer, and Philip Roth. At the same time, Wisse draws attention to the precarious conditions that call Jewish humor into being—and the price it may exact from its practitioners and audience. Wisse broadly traces modern Jewish humor around the world, teasing out its implications as she explores memorable and telling examples from German, Yiddish, English, Russian, and Hebrew. Among other topics, the book looks at how Jewish humor channeled Jewish learning and wordsmanship into new avenues of creativity, brought relief to liberal non-Jews in repressive societies, and enriched popular culture in the United States. Even as it invites readers to consider the pleasures and profits of Jewish humor, the book asks difficult but fascinating questions: Can the excess and extreme self-ridicule of Jewish humor go too far and backfire in the process? And is "leave 'em laughing" the wisest motto for a people that others have intended to sweep off the stage of history?
Translating the Jewish Freud
Author: Naomi SeidmanPublisher: Stanford University Press
ISBN: 1503639274
Category : Literary Criticism
Languages : en
Pages : 483
Book Description
There is an academic cottage industry on the "Jewish Freud," aiming to detect Jewish influences on Freud, his own feelings about being Jewish, and suppressed traces of Jewishness in his thought. This book takes a different approach, turning its gaze not on Freud but rather on those who seek out his concealed Jewishness. What is it that propels the scholarly aim to show Freud in a Jewish light? Naomi Seidman explores attempts to "touch" Freud (and other famous Jews) through Jewish languages, seeking out his Hebrew name or evidence that he knew some Yiddish. Tracing a history of this drive to bring Freud into Jewish range, Seidman also charts Freud's responses to (and jokes about) this desire. More specifically, she reads the reception and translation of Freud in Hebrew and Yiddish as instances of the desire to touch, feel, "rescue," and connect with the famous Professor from Vienna.
More Words, More Arrows
Author: Shirley KumovePublisher: Wayne State University Press
ISBN: 9780814327401
Category : Reference
Languages : en
Pages : 332
Book Description
These sayings, ditties, rhymes and word plays cover the full range of Yiddish folk sayings, from comic to serious. Kumove has even retained vulgarities as legitimate expressions that reflect the sensibilities of a particular time and place. The sayings are presented in bilingual format, with the original Yiddish transliterated into Roman letters and then translated into English. In some cases, both literal and interpretative translations are given.
Blessings, Curses, Hopes, and Fears
Author: James A. MatisoffPublisher: Stanford University Press
ISBN: 9780804733946
Category : Literary Criticism
Languages : en
Pages : 204
Book Description
In this delightful book, the author enumerates and classifies the formulas Yiddish speakers use to express their emotionsfrom blessings and thanks to lamentations and curses. A rarity among scholarly books, it brings joy while it teaches; it makes us smile, sometimes roar with laughter, while it develops the most rigorous linguistic argumentation."
Yiddish Sayings Mama Never Taught You
Author: Gershon WeltmanPublisher:
ISBN: 9781440140167
Category : Humor
Languages : en
Pages : 0
Book Description
"A cute and charming addition to Yiddish folklore." -I.B. Singer, Nobel Prize, 1978 "Juicy, savory, spicy." -Henry Miller The Yiddish sayings in this book have been praised by such world-acclaimed writers as Henry Miller and Isaac Bashevis Singer. They should equally delight all who can appreciate the coarse, wry humor of the turn-of-the-century European shtetl, which gave rise to so much of American humor as well. Some may be offended by their sexuality and lewdness, but they expose the basic humanity of a lost Jewish culture. For too long eydlkayt - refinement - has drawn a curtain over the smutty side of the shtetl. Enjoyable folklore, funny sayings you'll find yourself using in quite modern situations.
The Shabbat Elevator and other Sabbath Subterfuges
Author: Alan DundesPublisher: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers
ISBN: 1461645603
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 217
Book Description
There are literally hundreds if not thousands of books written about Judaism and Jews, but this book is unlike any previously published. It focuses on the topic of 'circumventing custom' with special emphasis on the ingenious ways Orthodox (and other) Jews have devised to avoid breaking the extensive list of activities forbidden on the Sabbath. After examining the sources of Sabbath observance as set forth in the Old Testament, the New Testament, and rabbinical writings, some of the most salient forms of circumvention are described. These include: riding a special Shabbat elevator, unscrewing the lightbulb in the refrigerator, constructing an eruv (a space extending one's domicile so that objects may be carried outside the home), and relying on the services of the so-called 'Shabbes Goy,' among others. Dundes respectfully analyzes such facets of Jewish characteristics as an undue concern with purity, and a long-established tradition of indulging in nit-picking and argumentation. The resultant picture of Jewish character is drawn from an unusual mixture of religious written texts and oral tradition (jokes and proverbs). The sources range from ancient Israel to works from the twenty-first century. In many ways, it is an authentic and striking Jewish self-portrait that is painted for the very first time in this fascinating volume.
Author: Joan Gloria Bratkowsky