Di Grine Kuzine – Yiddish song
Tzu mir is gekumen a kuzine
Shein vi gold iz zi geven, di grine.
Bekelach vi roite pomerantzn,
Fiselach vos betn zich tzum tantzn
Herelech vi zaidn-veb gelokte
Tzeindelech, vi perelech getokte
Eygelech vi himl-bloi in friling
Lipelech vi karshelech a tzviling
Nisht gegangen is zi, nor geshprungen,
Nisht geredt hot zi nor gezungen
Lebedik un freilech yede mine
Ot aza geven is main kuzine!
Un azoi ariber zainen yorn
Fun main kuzine is a tel gevorn
Peydes (Hasonim) hot zi vochenlang geklibn
Biz fun ir iz gornisht nit geblibn
Haint az ich bagegn main kuzine
Un ich freg ir: “s’machstu epes, grine?”
Ziftzt zi op, un ch’leien in ir mine:
“Brenen zol Colombus’es medine!”
TRANSLATION (ENGLISH):
My green cousin came to me.
She is my pretty green cousin,
With cheeks like red oranges
And her little feet just begging for a dance
Her curly hair was like silk,her white teeth – like
pearls,
her eyes – like the blue skies in springtime
and her lips like cherries
in the summer.
She didn’t walk, she jumped,
she didn’t speak, she sang,
lively and happy every minute,
that was my cousin.
What a beauty my cousin used to be.
Many years passed.
Her judgment of young men was too strict
And she remained single
Today, I meet my cousin and ask her,
“How are you doing, my green cousin?”
She only sighs, and replies,
“Let this Columbus’s land burn!”
Attn: slight variation to “Di Grine Kuzine” Dzheger wrote: slight variation to “Di Grine Kuzine”
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Song Title: Di Grine Kuzine — די גרינע קוזינע
Author: Leyzerovitz, Yakov — לײזעראָװיץ, יעקבֿ
Composer: Schwartz, Abe — שװאַרץ, אײב
English version:
My Little Cousin (Sam Braverman, Cy Coben, Happy Lewis, Eli Basse) February 5, 1942
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The movie YENTL: Isaac Bashevis Singer, the author of the short story “Yentl the Yeshiva Boy” on which the movie is based criticized Barbra Streisand for ending the movie with Yentl going to America. He wrote this in a “self-interview” in THE TIMES: “This is what Miss Streisand did by making Yentl, whose greatest passion was the Torah, go on a ship to America, singing at the top of her lungs. Why would she decide to go to America? Weren’t there enough yeshivas in Poland or in Lithuania where she could continue to study? Was going to America Miss Streisand’s idea of a happy ending for Yentl? What would Yentl have done in America? Worked in a sweatshop 12 hours a day where there is no time for learning? Would she try to marry a salesman in New York, move to the Bronx or to Brooklyn and rent an apartment with an ice box and a dumbwaiter? This kitsch ending summarizes all the faults of the adaptation. It was done without any kinship to Yentl’s character, her ideals, her sacrifice, her great passion for spiritual achievement.”
I doubt that Yentl would work in a sweatshop in America. I would place her in the jewish educational milieu of New York.
Yiddish theatre- The effect of the Holocaust
Like the rest of Yiddish-language culture, Yiddish theatre was devastated by the Holocaust. A major portion of the world’s Yiddish-speakers were killed and many theatres were destroyed. Many of the surviving Yiddish-speaking Ashkenazi emigrated to Israel, where many assimilated into the emerging Hebrew-language culture. Although its glory days have passed, Yiddish theatre companies still perform in various Jewish communities. The Folksbiene (People’s Theatre) company in New York City is still active 90 years after it was founded.