“Bay indz azoy fil kodres grine”, a Doina Performed by Anna Esther Steinbaum

Bay indz azoy fil kodres grine (“Doina”)
A Romanian poem adapted into a Yiddish song.
Sung by Anna Esther Steinbaum, recorded by Itzik Gottesman, Jerusalem 1997.

Commentary by Itzik Gottesman

The singer, Anna Esther Steinbaum (also known as Anna Rauchwerger Steinbaum), was from Chernovitz, Romania, and was active in the Yiddish cultural life there before the war. After the war, in Israel, she remained close to the Chernovitz intellectuals and translated Itzik Manger’s ballads into German.

Romania’s Mureș River

What makes this week’s song extraordinary is that though the text was written by an anti-Semitic, ultra-nationalist Romanian poet, whose politics were well known, a Yiddish poet found his poetry moving enough to adapt into a Yiddish song.

I met with her several times in 1997-98 in her apartment in Jerusalem. At this particular meeting my mother Beyle Schaechter-Gottesman was also present and occasionally can be heard as Steinbaum sings. Steinbaum found this song in a written notebook she had kept where she wrote down the songs she remembered. 

In her notebook the song is entitled “Doina” but it is  an adaptation of a Romanian poem “Noi” [“We”]  by Octavian Goga (1881 – 1938), a virulent fascist Romanian nationalist and anti-Semite, who was briefly the Romanian Prime Minister in 1938, when he stripped the Jews of their Romanian citizenship  

The Yiddish reworking of the song was done, according to Steinbaum, by the Romanian Yiddish writer Herts Rivkin, the author of the song “Nakhtishe lider” previously posted on the Yiddish Song of the Week. 

Here is a link to the longer original poem by Goga recited in Romanian with an English translation. 

Bay indz azoy fil kodres grine 

A Romanian poem by Octavian Goga, adapted in Yiddish by Hertz Rivkin. 

Bay indz azoy fil kodres grine [kodres=codri ]וועלדער 
velder fil mit korn. 
Bay undz azoy fil blumen, lider,
in shtiblekh fil mit tsorn. 

We have so mayn green woods,
forests full of rye.
We have so many flowers, songs,
in homes that are full of rage.

Kimen feygelekh fin vaytn
indzer doina hern. 
Bay indz azoy fil shmeterlingen
in taykhn trern, trern.

Birds come to us from afar
to hear our doina.
We have so many butterflies
in rivers of tears, tears.

Umet flist in shtiln muresh [Murăşul = Romanian river]
troyer rint in ovnt.
Es dertseylt fin indzer benkshaft
yeyder boym in vald.

Sadness flows quietly into the Murasul river;
Sadness runs in the evening.
Our longing is told by
every tree in the forest.

Zitsn mames gantse nekht,
shpinen layvnt, veybn. 
Tates, mames in oykh zin 
baveynen dus zeyer leybn.

Mothers stay up all night
spinning linen, weaving. 
Fathers, mother and sons too
lament their lives. 

Benkt zikh indz azoy nukh freyd.
Der vald iz undzer eydes.
Oysgevaremt hot di benkshaft
zeydes, elter-zeydes.

We yearn so for joy;
the woods are our witness.
This yearing was hatched 
by our grandfathers and their fathers. 

Un biz haynt iz ot der khulem
mekiyem nisht gevorn:
felder oysgebet mit veyts
shtiblekh fil mit tsorn. 

And till today this dream has
not been realized:
fields covered with wheat,
homes full of rage.

בײַ אונדז אַזוי פֿיל קאָדרעס גרינע
אַ רומעניש ליד פֿון אָקטאַוויאַן גאָגאַ
באַאַרבעט אויף ייִדיש פֿון הערץ ריווקין
געזונגען פֿון אַנאַ אסתּר שטיינבאַום

,בײַ אונדז אַזוי פֿיל קאָדרעס גרינע
.וועלדער פֿיל מיט קאָרן
,בײַי אונדז אַזוי פֿיל בלומען, לידער
.אין שטיבלעך פֿיל מיט צאָרן

זיצן מאַמעס גאנצע נעכט
.שפּינען לײַוונט, וועבן
טאַטעס, מאַמעס און אויך זין
.באַוויינען דאָס זייער לעבן

קומען פֿייגעלעך פֿון ווײַטן
.אונדזער דוינע הערן
בײַ אונדז אַזוי פֿיל שמעטערלינגען
.אין טײַכן טרערן, טרערן

אומעט פֿליסט אין שטילן מורעש
טרויער רינט אין אָוונט
עס דערציילט פֿון אונדזער בענקשאַפֿט
יעדער בוים אין וואַלד

.בענקט זיך אונדז אַזוי נאָך פֿרייד
.דער וואַלד איז אונדזער עדות
אויסגעוואַרעמט האָט די בענקשאפֿט
.זיידעס, עלטער־זיידעס

און ביז הײַנט איז אָט דער חלום 
.מקוים נישט געוואָרן
,פֿעלדער, אויסגעבעט מיט ווייץ
.שטיבלעך פֿול מיט צאָרן

“Der zeyde mit der babe” Performed by Beyle Schaechter Gottesman

Commentary by Itzik Gottesman

My mother Beyle Schaechter-Gottesman (BSG) could not remember from whom she learned this song, but it she learned it in Chernovitz in the 1930s. I had assumed it was either the creation of the humorist Shamshon  (Shamshele) Fersht or from the Chernovitz amateur Yiddish theater group Kamelyon directed by Simkhe Schwartz, but I can not yet find it listed anywhere. BSG also sang Fersht’s version/parody of Gebirtig’s Kinder yorn, and that can be found in Emil Seculetz’s collection Yidishe folkslider. She learned a number of Kamelyon‘s musical numbers which will be added to this blog at some point. The theatricality of this song leads me to suspect that it might have been created and performed by Kamelyon.

Beyle Schaechter-Gottesman (standing) with her cousin Sima. Chernovitz 1930s.

I have posted this song, which I recorded from her in the Bronx around 2009, on the occasion of BSG’s second yortsayt, the second day of khanike. In BSG’s dialect, the word for grandmother is  pronounced “babe” not “bobe”.

Der zeyde mit der babe is sort of an irreverent parody of Mark Warshavsky’s Akhtsik er un zibetsik zi but without the refrain. (Listen to BSG’s live version of Warshavsky’s song on her CD of songs she learned in Chernovitz – Bay mayn mames shtibele).

Der zeyde mit der babe, a leybn af zey.
A brukhe af zeyere keplekh.
Der zeyde khlepshtet fun der flash.
Di mame [babe] fun di teplekh.

Leberlekh un pipkelekh, vi oykh pitse.
Alding iz a maykhl.
Der zeyde glet di vontsyelekh.
Di babe glet dos baykhl.

Eydele, oy Eydele, tayere moyd,
zug zhe nor dem zeydn –
Veymen hosti tokhtershe
libersht fin indz beydn?

Indzer tayere skheyne Brane hot a kats
hot zi ketselekh kleyne.
Dus vayse ketsele mir geshenkt,
hob ikh lib di skheyne.

In oykh di Surtse, Sortse kroyn,
dem zeydns tayere meydn;
Veymen vilsti geybn a kish –
der baben tsi deym zeydn?

Mit Yankl didl-dudl un mit Yoselen
shpiln mir tate-mame beyde.
Iz Eydele di mame, di babe bin ikh,
kish ikh Yoselen dem zeydn.

Aza khtsife, aza shkuts –
dus vet men dertseyln der mamen.
A zeydn mit a baben hot men lib –
nisht di ketselekh fin Branen.

Aza hultayke, loz, shoyn loz.
dus vet men dertseyln dem tatn.
A zeydn un a baben git men a kish.
Nisht a Yosele piskatn.

Zeydishe un babeshi dertseylt, dertseylt.
Der mamen in dem tatn.
Zey meygn indz (un)shlugn* vi a pok.
S’vet indz gurnisht shatn.

Grandpa and grandma, may they be well,
a blessing on their heads.
Grandpa guzzles from the bottle,
Grandma [eats] from the pots.

Livers and gizzards, and calves foot jelly,
Everything is a dish.
Grandpa strokes his mustache,
Grandma rubs her belly.

Eydele, oy Eydele our dear girl,
tell your grandpa –
whom do you, daughter,
prefer of us two?

Our dear neighbor has a cat
and she has small kittens.
The white kitten was given to me as a gift,
so I like our neighbor.

And also you Surtse, dear Surtse
Grandpa’s beloved girl.
Whom do you want to kiss
Grandma or grandpa?

With Yankl Didl-Dudl and with Yosele;
We both play “father and mother”.
Eydele plays the mother, and I the grandma –
So I kiss Yosele the grandpa.

Such an impudent girl, such a prankster –
We will tell you mother.
You should love your grandpa and grandma
not the kittens of Brane.

Such a libertine, just wait and see;
we will tell your father.
You should give grandpa and grandma a kiss.
Not that mouthy Yosele.

Go ahead and tell, grandpa and grandma
our mother and father.
Even if they beat us like a drum.
It won’t bother us a bit.

*After singing the song, the singer commented that “unshlugn” would be better than “shlugn”.