Yiddish literature

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Yiddish literature is the literature of the Yiddish language written in Hebrew characters .

Periods of Yiddish Literature

Old Yiddish literature
from 13th century Origin of old Yiddish literature
14th century - approx. 1600 mainly epic works, prayers
16th century - approx. 1800 mainly Musar works (philosophical-theological, at times purely popularly designed edification literature).
Yiddish literature
from 1800 Decline of ancient Yiddish literature,
emergence of modern Yiddish literature: The Haskalah (Enlightenment) uses Yiddish to reach broader sections of the Jewish population.

Old Yiddish literature

Yiddish was the everyday language of Ashkenazi Jews in Central Europe. Hebrew, on the other hand, was the " holy language " of the Torah , the Talmud and other religious scriptures, rabbinical interpretations and official documents. So the altjiddische literature had a popular character ever, they often consisted of epics that their materials from the Bible , the Talmud and Midrash , but also drew on secular Middle High German and Old French templates.

The oldest known old Yiddish verse is in a manuscript by Worms Machsor from 1272. With the invention of the printing press , the spread of the works of old Yiddish literature increased. Important printing locations were in Krakow , Venice , Augsburg , Basel , Prague , Frankfurt am Main and Amsterdam .

For example, specialist prose texts from the field of medicine have also been documented since the High Middle Ages.

Works (selection)

Important works of old Yiddish literature were among others

Hasidism and Haskala

The works of the mystical-religious movement of Hasidism were written in Hebrew. Nathan von Brazlaw published some important parables by Nachman von Brazlaw in Yiddish in 1815 , which had an influence on later Yiddish literature.

The ideas of the Haskala and the Jewish Enlightenment were also published exclusively in Hebrew. Menachem Mendel Lefin tried to publish some Bible texts in Yiddish in 1815 and met with considerable resistance.

Yiddish literature in the 19th century

In forest . Leib Kwitkos children's book illustrated by Issachar Ber Ryback was printed in Berlin in 1922 for readers in Eastern Europe.

Modern Yiddish literature began with Solomon Ettinger and Abraham Bär Gottlober , also Israel Aksenfeld . It reached its climax in the works of Mendele Moicher Sforim , Itzhok Lejb Perez and Scholem Alejchem , the so-called three classics of Yiddish literature. While Mendele's works are characterized by their richness of expression and a socially critical point of view, Scholem Alejchem introduced new narrative techniques into Yiddish literature with works such as Josele Solovej or monologues . Perez, on the other hand, is best known for his literary modernism and the portrayal of the inner world of his characters.

Abraham Goldfaden became the founder of modern Yiddish theater , and Jacob Gordin was soon the most frequently performed author on the Yiddish stage.

In the western linguistic area, due to the assimilation of West Yiddish to Standard German, there was no comparable development of a linguistically independent literature, but there are forms in the area of ​​dialect poetry such as in the Palatinate-Yiddish works of Christian Heinrich Gilardone .

Yiddish literature in the 20th century

Abraham Reisen , Itzhok Lejb Perez , Schalom Asch , Chaim Schitlowsky and Hirsch David Nomberg in 1908 during the Chernivtsi Conference (from left)

Yiddish literature developed in the 20th century with authors such as Salomon An-ski , Josef Opatoschu , Pinchas Kahanowitsch in Russia and the Soviet Union or Shalom Asch , Israel Joschua Singer , Moische Broderson , Lamed Shapiro and Isaak Kazenelson in Poland.

Several authors emigrated to the USA. A literary scene made up of emigrants and locals developed there. Well-known authors from the New York scene were Morris Winchevsky, Morris Rosenfeld, David Edelstadt and Jehoasch (Solomon Bloomgarden). Yiddish literature received a lot of attention after Isaac Bashevis Singer won the 1978 Nobel Prize for Literature .

After the Second World War, Yiddish literature developed in Palestine and later in Israel with writers such as Avrom Sutzkever and Lejb Rochman . Sutzkever became known as 'the poet of the Holocaust' with works such as Fun wilner geto or Di feaßung . From 1949 he published the magazine Di goldne keyt in Tel-Aviv . Rochman's work primarily deals with the author's traumatic experiences as a Holocaust survivor. His best known book is Un in dajn blut solstu live . Jossel Birstein initially wrote exclusively in Yiddish and also translated his works into Ivrit.

From the interwar period onwards, some female authors became known, especially Anna Margolin (Rosa Lebensboym), Celia Dropkin and Kadia Molodowsky . The three writers were from Belarus and later immigrated to the USA.

Since the second half of the 20th century there have been a certain number of publications of Yiddish works that appear in a Latin transcription in order to bring Yiddish closer to those who are interested in reading the Hebrew script. Sometimes both fonts can be found on opposite pages.

See also

literature

Anthologies

  • Antologje fun of Yiddish literature far jugnt. More shook hands with J. Silberberg and J. Mark , two hands with shook by Chaim Bes. Arojßgegebn fun school center at Alweltlechn Yidish culture congress. 3rd ed. Shulsinger Bros., New York 1981. [Yiddish.]
  • An antologje fun, the modern Yidish poesje. An Anthology of Modern Yiddish Poetry. Selected and Translated by Ruth Whitman, with an introductory note by Nobel prizewinner Isaac Bashevis Singer. 2nd ed. Workmen's Circle, New York 1979. [Yiddish and English.]
  • Early Yiddish Epic. Edited and translated by Jerold C. Frakes. Syracuse University Press, Syracuse NY 2014. ISBN 978-0-8156-3355-6 . [English.]
  • Feather people. Yiddish stories and poems about firebirds, air travel, unlucky ravens and fallen angels. Edited by Andrej Jendrusch. Klaus Wagenbach, Berlin 1996. ISBN 978-3-8031-3117-1 . [German.]
  • Yiddish stories by Mendele Mojcher Sforim , Jizchak Lejb Perez and Scholem Alejchem , selection, translation from Yiddish and epilogue by Leo Nadelmann, Manesse Verlag, Zurich 1997, ISBN 3-7175-1678-7 .
  • The Penguin Book of Modern Yiddish Verse. Edited by Irving Howe, Ruth R. Wisse, and Khone Shmeruk. Penguin Books, New York 1988. ISBN 0-14-009472-5 . [Yiddish and English.]

Overall representations

German

  • Helmut Dinse: The development of Yiddish literature in the German-speaking area . Metzler, Stuttgart 1974, ISBN 3-476-00277-2 .
  • Helmut Dinse, Sol [Solomon] Liptzin: Introduction to Yiddish Literature (=  Metzler Collection . Volume 165 ). Metzler, Stuttgart 1978, ISBN 3-476-10165-7 .
  • Günter Stemberger : History of Jewish Literature. An introduction . Verlag C. H. Beck, Munich 1977 (= Beck'sche Elementarbücher), ISBN 3-406-06698-4 , p. 149.

Yiddish

  • Salman Reisen : Lexicon fun of Yiddish literature and press . Vilnius 1914

English

  • Mikhail Krutikov: Yiddish Literature. In: The YIVO Encyclopedia of Jews in Eastern Europe . Edited by David Gershom Hundred. Yale University Press, New Haven / London 2008, pp. 2059-2084. Also online .
  • Dan Miron: Yiddish Prose. In: The YIVO Encyclopedia of Jews in Eastern Europe. Edited by David Gershom Hundred. Yale University Press, New Haven / London 2008, pp. 1472-1477. Also online .
  • Avraham Novershtern: Yiddish Poetry. In: The YIVO Encyclopedia of Jews in Eastern Europe. Edited by David Gershom Hundred. Yale University Press, New Haven / London 2008, pp. 1371-1375. Also online.
  • Israel Zinberg (Ed.): History of Jewish Literature. KTAV Publishing House et al., New York NY et al. 1975, ISBN 0-87068-465-5 .

Individual topics

German

  • Paris and Vienna. A 16th century Yiddish punch novel by (or from the circle of) Elia Levita. Introduced, edited in transcription and commented by Erika Timm with the assistance of Gustav Adolf Beckmann. Niemeyer Verlag, Tübingen 1996.
  • Sefer Mišle Šuolim (Book of Fox Fables) by Jakob Koppelmann. Edited in original script and transcription. and commented by Jutta Schumacher. Buske, Hamburg 2006.
  • Helmut Braun (Ed.): "My dear Roisele!" Itzig Manger - Elieser Steinbarg . Yiddish poet of Bukovina. Illustrator Arthur Kolnik . Publication series of the Rose Ausländer-Gesellschaft, 6. Üxheim 1996 ISBN 978-3-86575-255-0
  • Elke-Vera Kotowski: "... a thejl fun of that force" - "... a part of that force". Yiddish translations of German-language literature in the interwar period (1919–1939). Hentrich & Hentrich, Leipzig 2020, ISBN 978-3-95565-373-6 .
  • Andreas Martin and Robert Rothmann (eds.): But now Tacheles. Yiddish jokes and anecdotes. With a foreword by State Rabbi Salomon Almekias-Siegl. R. Brockhaus, Wuppertal 2005, ISBN 3-417-20662-6 .
  • Tamar Lewinsky: Displaced poets . Yiddish writers in post-war Germany 1945–1951 (=  Jewish religion, history and culture (JRGK) . Volume 9 ). Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, Göttingen 2008, ISBN 978-3-525-56997-9 (Zugl. Diss. Phil. University of Munich, 2006).
  • Timo Obergöker: Memories from beyond the ghetto. Yiddish in French literature after 1945. in: Fernand Höhner, Susanne Gramatzki and others. (Ed.): Hyphenation or bridging. Translation as a literary and linguistic phenomenon. Files of the 20th Forum for Young Romance Studies 2004. Romanistischer Verlag, Bonn 2009.
  • Erika Timm, Gustav Adolf Beckmann: Etymological studies on Yiddish. Buske, Hamburg 2006.
  • Erika Timm, with the assistance of Gustav Adolf Beckmann: Historical Yiddish Semantics. The Bible translation language as a factor in the development of the Yiddish and German vocabulary. Niemeyer, Tübingen 2005.
  • Oliver Vrankovic: Yiddish for beginners. The Tel Aviv-based initiative Yung Yidish is trying to breathe new life into the language. In: Dschungel, supplement to jungle world 42, Berlin October 15, 2017, pp. 10–14 (also online).

English

  • Adina Bar-El: Children's Literature. Yiddish Literature. In: The YIVO Encyclopedia of Jews in Eastern Europe. Edited by David Gershom Hundred. Yale University Press, New Haven 2008, pp. 322-326. online .
  • Israel Zinberg (Ed.): Old Yiddish literature from its origins to the Haskalah period. KTAV Publishing House et al., New York NY et al. 1975, ISBN 0-87068-465-5

Web links

Remarks

  1. ↑ Volker Zimmermann: Yiddish Pharmacopoeia. In: Werner E. Gerabek , Bernhard D. Haage, Gundolf Keil , Wolfgang Wegner (eds.): Enzyklopädie Medizingeschichte. De Gruyter, Berlin / New York 2005, ISBN 3-11-015714-4 , p. 696 f.
  2. ^ Mendele Mojcher Sforim, Jizchak Lejb Perez and Scholem Alejchem: Yiddische Erzählungen , Manesse Verlag, Zurich 1984, ISBN 3-7175-1678-7
  3. ↑ exhibition catalog. The title comes from a letter from Kolnik to foreigners. Other authors Rose Ausländer , Alfred Margul-Sperber , Alfred Kittner , Edith Silbermann, Helios Hecht and others. Other ISBNs: ISBN 3-932670-05-1 ISBN 3-931826-07-4
  4. ↑ The first 15 can be read on the Internet (only as a temporary .pdf), as is a review by Rebekka Denz