This is the Forward’s coverage of the Yiddish language historically spoken by Ashkenazi Jews in Europe and still spoken by many Hasidic Jews today.
For more stories on Yiddishkeit, see Yiddish World, and for stories written in Yiddish,…
Yiddish
The Latest
-
Fast Forward Wiretapped Yiddish Small Talk Could Derail Wideranging N.Y. Corruption Trial
A sprawling New York state corruption trial could reportedly be seriously delayed or even derailed by some 300 recordings of an upstate Hasidic wheeler-dealer chatting in Yiddish. A federal judge is considering his options after defense lawyers for disgraced state Sen. Malcolm Smith complained that they had not had a chance to listen to the…
-
News How Do You Talk Dirty in Yiddish?
Have you ever wondered how you might say “quickie” in Yiddish? Or maybe “sugar daddy” or “one-night stand”? You wouldn’t be the first. In 60 years of researching the Yiddish language, linguist Mordkhe Schaechter collected vocabulary on every aspect of human life and developed vocabulary lists for many specialized subjects not covered in detail by…
-
Opinion Alexander Imich, Czar’s Last Bar Mitzvah Boy
Alexander Imich at 111 years old / Guinness Book of World Records Ray Bradbury, in his classic 1955 story “The Last, the Very Last,” has a child encounter a 108-year-old man believed to be the last known Civil War veteran. The story, reworked as a chapter in his novel Dandelion Wine, introduces the veteran to…
-
The Schmooze ‘Fiddler’ Lyricist Sheldon Harnick Turns 90
“The sad thing is that Joe Stein and Jerry Bock can’t be part of this celebration,” mused lyricist Sheldon Harnick at his 90th birthday bash hosted on June 2 by Jeffrey Wiesenfeld, a principal of Bernstein Global Management at its New York City headquarters. It was Stein who wrote the book, and Bock who wrote…
-
The Schmooze 6 Things About ‘Fiddler on the Roof’ on 50th Anniversary
On Monday, the Folksbiene theater will celebrate the 50th anniversary “Fiddler on the Roof.” In honor of this auspicious birthday, we bring you a trove of obscure fun facts about the Jewish classic. If nothing else, you can bust it out at Shabbat dinner to one-up the family. What else is useless knowledge for? 1.Richard…
-
Culture Does Translating Yiddish Preserve History Or Betray It?
Writing in Tongues: Translating Yiddish in the 20th Century By Anita Norich University of Washington Press, 160 pages, $30 Translators are villains, lechers, traitors. Like the spinster who translates Yankel Ostrover’s stories in Cynthia Ozick’s “Envy; or, Yiddish in America,” they are vain. “Who has read James Joyce, Ostrover or I?” she seethes. “I didn’t…
-
Culture The Last Living Yiddish Speaker in Lviv
This article originally appeared in the Yiddish Forverts. During an emotional scene in the new documentary film “Boris Dorfman: A Mentsh,” the 90-year-old Dorfman stands in a forest near Rudno, Ukraine, at the spot where the Germans murdered the last surviving Jews from the Lviv ghetto in June of 1943. Near a memorial-marker that he…
-
Culture Why You Shouldn’t Call Mel Bochner a Lox Jock
From King Solomon to Ludwig Wittgenstein — with the notable exception of Moses — Jews have always been people of words. It seems appropriate, therefore, that the artist Mel Bochner’s new exhibition at the Jewish Museum, a retrospective of decades’ worth of his work and his first major museum show in New York City, is…
Explore
Most Popular
- 1
Israel News Somaliland already operates as a de facto state. So why is Israel’s recognition of it so controversial?
- 2
Fast Forward The judge in Maduro’s case is an Orthodox Jew — and displays a Torah verse in his chambers
- 3
News He stormed the Capitol wearing a Camp Auschwitz sweatshirt 5 years ago. Where is he now?
- 4
Antisemitism Decoded Things are only going to get worse for Jews from here
In Case You Missed It
-
Film & TV An idyllic Jewish village, full of life and hope, just hours before its utter annihilation
-
Fast Forward Pardoned Jan. 6 protester Jake Lang throws chocolate coins, Nazi salute during anti-AIPAC demonstration in DC
-
News She helped rescue the Torahs from their burning synagogue. A year later, the congregation is thriving.
-
Opinion I grew up in Venezuela. Will Maduro’s ouster bring my Jewish community the security we need?
-
Shop the Forward Store
100% of profits support our journalism
