If You Can't Say Anything Nice, Say It in Yiddish

Author: Lita Epstein
Publisher: Citadel Press
ISBN: 0806538767
Category : Foreign Language Study
Languages : en
Pages : 209

Book Description
You don’t have to be Jewish to get back at the shmendriks* of the world Yiddish. It’s the most colorful language in the history of mankind. What other language gives you a whole dictionary of ways to tell someone to drop dead? That schmuck who got promoted over you? Meigulgl zol er vern in a henglaykhter, by tog zol er hengen, un by nakht zol er brenen. (He should be transformed into a chandelier, to hang by day and to burn by night.) That soccer mom kibitzing on her cell phone and tying up traffic? Shteyner zol zi hobn, nit keyn kinder. (She should have stones and not children.) If You Can’t Say Anything Nice, Say It in Yiddish is the perfect glossary of Yiddish insults and curses, from the short and sweet to the whole megillah (Khasene hobn zol er mit di malekh hamoves tokhter: He should marry the daughter of the Angel of Death.) Complete with hundreds of the most creative insults for the putzes** and kvetchers *** of the world, this is an indispensable guide for Jews and Gentiles alike. When it comes to cursing someone who sorely needs it, may you never be at a loss for words again. *Idiots **More idiots ***Complainer; a pain in the tuchas**** **** One’s rear end

If You Can't Say Anything Nice, Say it in Yiddish

Author: Lita Epstein
Publisher:
ISBN: 9780760786734
Category : Blessing and cursing
Languages : en
Pages : 198

Book Description

If You Cant' Say Anything Nice, Say it in Yiddish

Author: Lita Epstein
Publisher:
ISBN: 9781906217075
Category : Blessing and cursing
Languages : en
Pages : 202

Book Description
You don't have to be Jewish to get back at the shmendriks of the world! Yiddish - the most colourful language in the history of mankind. What other language gives you a whole dictionary of ways to tell someone to drop dead? That schmuck, for instance, who got promoted over you? He should be transformed into a chandelier, to hang by day and to burn by night. In these endlessly entertaining pages, you will find the perfect insult for every occasion, from the short and sweet (A plague on you - a finsteren yor) to the whole megillah (He should marry the daughter of the Angel of Death - khasene hobn zol er mit di malekh hamoves tokhter). Complete with hundreds of the most creative curses for the putzes and kvetchers of the world, together with the fascinating background of their origins and much Jewish wisdom born of suffering over the centuries, this is an indispensable guide for Jews and Gentiles alike. When it comes to cursing someone who sorely needs it, may you never be at a loss for words again. After Amo, Amas, Amat it's time to enjoy the joys of Yiddish! This work is very funny, and scholarly too. If you don't buy this book, may a soft balcony fall on your head! It contains all the wisdom (and curses!) born of the Jewish experience over thousands of years.

Just Say Nu

Author: Michael Wex
Publisher: St. Martin's Press
ISBN: 1429919728
Category : Reference
Languages : en
Pages : 332

Book Description
A cross between Henry Beard's Latin for All Occasions and Ben Schott's Schott's Original Miscellany, JUST SAY NU is a practical guide to using Yiddish words and expressions in day-to-day situations. Along with enough grammar to enable readers to put together a comprehensible sentence and avoid embarrassing mistakes, Wex also explains the five most useful Yiddish words–shoyn, nu, epes, takeh,and nebakh–what they mean, how and when to use them, and how they can be used to conduct an entire conversation without anybody ever suspecting that the reader doesn't have the vaguest idea of what anyone is actually saying. Readers will learn how to shmooze their way through such activities as meeting and greeting; eating and drinking; praising and finding fault; maintaining personal hygiene; going to the doctor; driving; parenting; getting horoscopes; committing crimes; going to singles bars; having sex; talking politics and talking trash. Now that Stephen Colbert, a Catholic from South Carolina and host of the "Colbert Report," is using Yiddish to wish viewers a bright and happy Chanukah, people have finally started to realize that there's nothing in the world that can't be improved by translating it into Yiddish. Wex's JUST SAY NU is the book that's going to show them how.

No Joke

Author: Ruth R. Wisse
Publisher: Princeton University Press
ISBN: 0691149461
Category : Literary Criticism
Languages : en
Pages : 296

Book Description
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. A.

Born to Kvetch LP

Author: Michael Wex
Publisher: Harper Collins
ISBN: 0061340847
Category : Language Arts & Disciplines
Languages : en
Pages : 450

Book Description
A delightful excursion through the Yiddish language, the culture it defines and serves, and the fine art of complaint Throughout history, Jews around the world have had plenty of reasons to lament. And for a thousand years, they've had the perfect language for it. Rich in color, expressiveness, and complexity, Yiddish has proven incredibly useful and durable. Its wonderful phrases and idioms impeccably reflect the mind-set that has enabled the Jews of Europe to survive a millennium of unrelenting persecution . . . and enables them to kvetch about it! Michael Wex—professor, scholar, translator, novelist, and performer—takes a serious yet unceasingly fun and funny look at this remarkable kvetch-full tongue that has both shaped and has been shaped by those who speak it. Featuring chapters on curse words, food, sex, and even death, he allows his lively wit and scholarship to roam freely from Sholem Aleichem to Chaucer to Elvis. Perhaps only a khokhem be-layle (a fool, literally a "sage at night," when there's no one around to see) would care to pass up this endearing and enriching treasure trove of linguistics, sociology, history, and folklore—an intriguing appreciation of a unique and enduring language and an equally fascinating culture.

Drek!

Author: Yetta Emmes
Publisher: Penguin
ISBN: 1440621152
Category : Humor
Languages : en
Pages : 116

Book Description
One doesn't have to be Jewish to recognize the words that have made their way into every fold of popular language: Chutzpah, Mensch, Tokhes, Mishmash, Nudge, Shtick, Schmaltzy, Schlep, Icky, and so on. Then there are phrases whose meaning and syntax are borrowed from Yiddish: "bite your tongue", "drop dead", "enough already", and "excuse the expression". This hilarious, concise guide includes chapters on the Basic Descriptions of People (the good, the bad, the ugly, and the goofy), the Fine Art of Cursing, Juicy Words and Phrases, Exclamations and Exasperations, and the Fine Art of Blessing.

Dirty Yiddish

Author: Adrienne Gusoff
Publisher: Simon and Schuster
ISBN: 1612430805
Category : Foreign Language Study
Languages : en
Pages : 185

Book Description
Next time you’re chattin’ with your khaverim (friends) and mishpukheh (family), bust out some Yiddish expressions that’ll liven up the conversation. Nothing is censored in Dirty Yiddish. It includes phrases for any situation, so readers have enough chutzpah (balls) to tell the local deli that they’ve waited long enough for their knish, and explicit swear words crude enough to shock Bubby and everyone else at the Passover seder. There’s even vulgar sex terminology so graphic it puts the outspoken Lower East Side princesses to shame. Bust out with expressions they never teach you in school, including cool slang, funny insults, explicit sex terms, and raw swear words. Dirty Yiddish teaches the casual expressions heard every day on the streets of New York . . . What’s up? Vos makhst du? Crazy bastard! Meshuggeneh momzer! I’m hammered. Ikh bin fershikkert. Don’t fuck with me! Bareh mikh nit! I have the shits. Ikh hob a shittern mogn. Lick my pussy. Lekh meyn lokh. Was it good for you? Tsufreedn?

Interjections, Translation, and Translanguaging

Author: Rosanna Masiola
Publisher: Lexington Books
ISBN: 1498574653
Category : Language Arts & Disciplines
Languages : en
Pages : 267

Book Description
This book is about interjections and their transcultural issues. Challenging the marginalization of the past, the ubiquity of interjections and translational practices are presented in their multilingual and cross-cultural aspects. The survey widens the field of inquiry to a multi-genre and context-based perspective. The quanti-qualitative corpus has been processed on the base of topics of relevance and thematization. The range of examples varies from adaptation of novels into films, from Shakespeare, from Zulu oral epics to opera, from children’s narratives to cartoons, from migration literature to gangster and horror films and their audiovisual translation. The use of American Yiddish, Italian American, South African English, and Jamaican account for the controversial aspects of interjections as a universal phenomenon, and, conversely, as a pragmatic marker of identity in (post)colonial contexts.

The Holocaust & the Exile of Yiddish

Author: Barry Trachtenberg
Publisher: Rutgers University Press
ISBN: 1978825455
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 307

Book Description
This book tells the saga of the Yiddish-language general encyclopedia Algemeyne entsiklopedye (1932-1966) and the editors who continued to publish it even as they were sent into repeated exile and their world was utterly transformed by the Holocaust. It is not a story only about destruction and trauma, but also one of tenacity and continuity, as the encyclopedia's compilers strove to preserve the heritage of Yiddish culture, to document its near-total extermination in the Holocaust, and to chart its path into the future.