Interesting articles about this year's KlezKamp from our friends at the Algemeiner Journal:
יידיש Yiddish: http://www.algemeiner.com/generic.asp?id=2759
English: http://www.algemeiner.com/generic.asp?ID=2776
Hebrew: http://www.shturem.net/index.php?section=news&id=11768&lang=hebrew
KlezKamp26
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2 comments:
It's interesting that Jacobson is trying in this article to sound the death knell for secular Yiddish, and using Itche Goldberg's passing as its funeral.
I'm sure that it's been the AJ viewpoint since its first issue that Yiddish or Yiddish culture not founded on Orthodox Judaism is not the "emetser zakh". So Jacobson's dismissive attitude toward the non-Orthodox -- and non-Jewish -- musicians bringing their own personal or secular interpretations to klezmer and Yiddish culture is no surprise.
But without enlightened, relatively secular Jewish writers like Peretz, Sholom Aleichem, Sforim and the parade of other "worldly" artists that followed them, Yiddish culture would not have survived into the 20th and 21st centuries to be enjoyed by millions everywhere.
It would be languishing in Miami Beach, and in Borough Park, the latter being the only place where Jacobson seems to feel people have the right to speak the mame-loshn, dance a hora, tell a mayse, play a klezmer nigun, and sing a lid.
Z'is a shod, but somehow I think Yiddish culture will survive -- and thrive -- without Jacobson's imprimatur.
I am Jacobson (Mendel) of whom you speak.
If you've read the AJ since its inception, you would know that not only does it not dismiss "non-orthodox" Jews but that many of its writers (not to mention its readers) were (and still are) what you would call "secular" - and if we didn’t think they were "emeser zakhen" we wouldn’t print them.
It is true that in my piece I made no mention of the virtues of cultural Yiddish - the brilliant literature, music... - but that's only because no mention was made of it's vices either (I was merely reporting points of YY Jacobson's lecture).
Your assuming that I think only people in "Miami Beach" and "Borough Park" have a right to Yiddish is just plain unfair - ask anyone at Klezkamp if they felt that way.
As for Itche Goldberg: I do believe his passing is the end of one era and the beginning of another - an era where the wall between "secular" and "religious" will come tumbling down.
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